LIBRARY OF CONGRESS. 



Chap Copyright No. 

ShelcLB-Uk? 

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA. 



THE KINDERGARTEN 
IN A NUTSHELL 





LADIES' HOME JOURNAL 




PRACTICAL LIBRARY 


Vol. 


I. — The Kindergarten in a Nutshell, by Nora 




A. Smith. 


Vol. 


II. — Successward, by Edward Bok, Editor of the 




Ladies Home Journal. 


Vol 


III. — Good Cooking, by Mrs. Rorer. 


Vol 


IV. — Inside ioo Homes, by W. M. Johnson. 


Vol 


V.— Model Homes at Low Cost, by W. M. Price. 



LADIES' HOME JOURNAL 
PRACTICAL LIBRARY 



THE KINDERGARTEN 
IN A NUTSHELL 



A Handbook for the Home 



NORA ARCHIBALD SMITH 

AUTHOR OF "UNDER THE CACTUS FLAG" AND "THE 
CHILDREN OF THE FUTURE," AND JOINT AUTHOR WITH 
KATE DOUGLAS WIGGIN OF "THE REPUBLIC OB CHILD- 
HOOD," "CHILDREN'S RIGHTS," "THE STORY HOUR," 
AND " KINDERGARTEN CHIMES." 



I8 99 



PHILADELPHIA 

CURTIS PUBLISHING 
COMPANY 



NEW YORK 

DOUBLEDAY & 
McCLURE CO. 



LBlltf 
.Sfc 



«^.„ 



:■>(, 



47/06 

Copyright, 1899, b y 
The Curtis Publishing Company 

TWO COPIES RECEIVED. 



^Vv 











PREFACE 



Many readers are as impatient as Lord 
Bacon ivas of ' ' prefaces, passages, and ex- 
cusations" and yet a preface may some- 
times be as necessary as the preliminary sip 
the duck takes before slipping into the water, 
— a procedure apparently not so much an 
end in itself as a preparation for what is 
to follow. 

To begin the preface, then, the series of 
papers from which, with considerable addi- 
tion and alteration, this little volume has 
been made was originally written for ' ' The 
Ladies' 1 Home Journal" in response to the 
requests of many of its subscribers that they 
might know something of the kindergarten 
as a means of development for children and 
of the possible adaptation of its principles 
to the home. 

The requests, from men as well as women, 
fathers as well as mothers, naturally came 
for the most part from dwellers in isolated 



Preface 

places, villages, and the smaller towns of 
this and other countries ; and it is for them 
that this handbook is intended, rather than 
for people within easy reach of the advan- 
tages of a great city. The number of let- 
ters of inquiry which the articles have called 
forth testifies to a general interest in the sub- 
ject, while the tone of some of them makes it 
necessary to say again that the papers were 
never for a moment supposed to take the 
place of instruction in a training school, 
nor to produce a finished kinder gartner. 
No book, be it ever so bulky and comprehen- 
sive, could attempt to do that, nor could it 
give so adequate an idea of the child-garden 
as a single day spent in one of those ideal 
communities would impart. But there are 
many parents, past, present, and future, as 
well as many persons vicariously interested 
in the training of children, who lack the 
time, the opportunity, or the means to gain 
a thorough knowledge of FroebeVs educa- 
tional philosophy and yet are most anxious 
to learn as much of it as may lie within 
their power. 

To such persons, and their name is ap- 
parently legion in America, this handbook 
is addressed, and not to those desirous of 
opening a kindergarten as a means of live- 
vi 



Preface 

lihood, nor to those who aspire to learn by 
reading or correspondence what can never 
be thoroughly understood save by viva voce 
instruction, explanation, and practice. 

If its purpose is clearly defined, its brevity 
will be as clearly comprehended, and also the 
fact that it aims to create an appetite for 
the subject, rather than to gratify it. If it 
serves as an introduction to the study of the 
kindergarten, if it leads some mothers to go 
direct to Froebel and learn from him the 
magic words that will turn their tasks into 
pleasures, if it persuades a few young women 
to take the kindergarten training, not alone 
that they may become independent, but for 
the sake of a fairer, fuller womanhood, it 
will have more than fulfilled its reason of 
being. 

The title of the manual, " The Kinder- 
garten in a Nutshell," may seem an arro- 
gant one to those who believe, as indeed the 
author does, that a lifetime of study is not 
enough for the understanding of FroebeVs 
philosophy. One would say, on first thought, 
that to condense such infinite riches in so 
little room would be a task for him who 
packed Pandora's box, or compressed the 
Arabian genie into the bottle ; but, on second 
thought, one would see perhaps that all a 
vii 



Preface 

nut need hold is the life-principle, and the 
mustard-seed is proof of how tiny that may 
be. If still you question whether this prin- 
ciple can persist in so confined a space, put 
it to the test. Plant the nut in favourable 
soil, and if, indeed, not one green shoot 
appear, then the author will confess her 
failure. 



vm 



Contents. 



CHAPTER 

I. What is the Kindergarten ? 
II. What Shall We Play with ? 

III. What Shall We Make ? . . 

IV. Nature's Toys and Pastimes 
V. Come, Tell Us a Story . . 

VI. Come and Play with Us . . 



PAGE 
1 

22 
43 
65 
80 
102 



VII. Come, Let Us Live with Our Children 123 



Joy to the laughing troop 

That from the threshold starts, 

Led on by courage and immortal hope, 

And with the morning in their hearts. 

They to the disappointed earth shall give 

The lives we meant to live, 

Beautiful, free, and strong ; 

The light we almost had 

Shall make them glad ; 

The words we waited long 

Shall run in music from their voice and song. 

Unto our world hope's daily oracles 

From their lips shall be brought ; 

And in our lives love's hourly miracles 

By them be wrought. 

Their merry task shall be 

To make the house all fine and sweet, 

Its new inhabitants to greet 

The wondrous dawning century. 

Edward Rowland Sill. 



The Kindergarten in a 
Nutshell 

CHAPTER I 

WHAT IS THE KLNDERGAKTEX ? 

What is the kindergarten ? The word 
has made itself a home in English now; it 
may be considered to be thoroughly natu- 
ralized; but perhaps even yet it is not uni- 
versally understood in its adopted country, 
for, though a good citizen, it retains a 
touch of foreign accent. What does the 
word mean in the German, and why did 
the great teacher, Eriedrich Froebel, cry 
"Eureka!" when it first came to his 
mind as fitly descriptive of his new edu- 
cational institution ? 

Kindergarten — child-garden: the name 
is simple enough and yet it is absolutely 
1 



i 



The Kindergarten 

new, while there is a touch of genius in its 
simplicity and in its perfect adaptation to 
the system it describes. 

The True Meaning of the Word 
What does the word garden suggest to 
us ? A sheltered spot, guarded from rough 
winds and open to the sunshine, rich, 
fruitful earth, carefully trained vines, 
blooming flowers, soft green turf, well- 
kept paths, abundance of air and dew and 
rain, and everywhere freshness and fra- 
grance and loveliness. And what of the 
gardener, what are his duties ? It is he who 
lays out the garden, who prepares the earth, 
who plans the wind-breaks, who sets out 
the plants in favourable locations accord- 
ing to their kind, who uproots the weeds, 
destroys noxious insects, prunes and trains, 
mows the turf, protects the tender seed- 
lings from glare of sun, and provides water 
when the skies are niggardly. He does all 
these things, if he is wise and careful, but 
he knows that flower and tree and vine and 
grass-blade must do their own growing, 
and that neither dew nor rain, air nor sun- 
2 



In a Nutshell 

shine are his to give. Saint Paul under- 
stood the philosophy of the matter when 
he said : " So then neither is he that plant- 
eth anything, neither he that watereth ; but 
God that giveth the increase." 

Just as the gardener knows that the mi- 
raculous life-principle exists in every seed 
he sows, and will develop under the right 
conditions, so Froebel believes that in every 
child there is the possibility of a perfect 
man, and that it is the task of the educa- 
tor to provide the conditions which will 
develop that possibility. 

It is that portion of FroebePs philosophy 
which relates to the training of children 
below school age that we are to discuss in 
this volume, and it is his insistence upon 
the importance of this formative period 
that furnishes one of his distinctive contri- 
butions to educational ideals. The kin- 
dergarten was the product of the lifelong 
thought, study, and experience of a pro- 
found child -observer and child-lover, a man 
rich in native insight and wisdom, and well 
yersed in the knowledge of the schools. It 
provides for the young human plant the 
3 



The Kindergarten 

proper conditions for growth and harmoni- 
ous development, suitable climate, soil, and 
exposure, careful nurture, happy occupa- 
tion for activities of soul, mind, and body, 
and opportunities for the learning of those 
relationships which bind man to his fellow- 
creatures, to nature, and to God. 

The Aim of Kindergarten Discipline 
The aim in discipline is to make each 
child self-governing, and at the same time 
to teach him his responsibility toward, and 
dependence upon, the community of which 
he is a part. We believe that kindergar- 
ten principles, when rightly applied in the 
training of American children, will prove 
of the greatest efficiency in correcting the 
faults to which they seem peculiarly sub- 
ject. Whether it be due to the climate, 
that convenient scapegoat for our national 
failings, or whether, a far more likely sup- 
position, it comes from over-indulgence, 
undue notice, undue prominence at home, 
our children arc often markedly nervous, 
high-strung, precocious, and therefore 
somewhat difficult to manage. They lack 

4 



In a Nutshell 

that fine flower-like serenity, that healthy 
physical poise, that red-cheeked, bread- 
and-milk, early -to -bed -and -early -to -rise 
vigour which mark their little English cou- 
sins, for instance ; and though we may be 
proud of their superior quickness and vi- 
vacity, our pride must droop a little wbeg/?- 
we see how easily these may degenera 
into positive faults. 

When we hear the traveller say, as we 
sometimes do, that American women are 
charming, American men fine fellows, but 
American children detestable, the fire 
flashes in our eyes for a minute, and then 
we look about us to see what foundation 
there may be for the remark. Granted 
that it is not and never could be said of 
your children and of mine, but how about 
our neighbours' ? Do we find in them any 
failings which a just, reasonable, firm, 
though gentle government, appropriate to 
their needs and to their years, might have 
corrected had they been subject to it from 
the beginning? If so, then we may well 
recommend the application of discipline 
according to the ideals of Froebel, satisfied 
5 



The Kindergarten 

that such discipline will bring poise, calm- 
ness, self-control, self-forgetfulness, and 
helpfulness, and that therefore it is espe- 
cially well fitted for the coming citizen of a 
republic. Not only is it a school of citizen- 
ship, but it is a school of patriotism also, 
for it trains the child from the beginning 
in the history of his country, so far as 
his undeveloped powers are able to receive 
it, and places before him in the national 
hero-stories an ideal toward which he may 
struggle in the future. 

Women the Natural Educators of Children 
Valuable as the kindergarten is to the 
child, it is no less valuable to the woman 
who studies, who broods over, who lives 
out its principles. 

It was Froebel who said that the destiny 
of nations lies in the hands of women, and 
to them he turns as the natural and inev- 
itable educators of the human race. No 
woman who has read Froebel and believed 
his words can feel thereafter that her sphere 
is small, her opportunities restricted, for 
he gives her a new light upon her life, and 
6 



In a Nutshell 

especially upon that <; quiet, secluded sanc- 
tuary of the family which only can give 
back to us the welfare of mankind."' It 
is because his philosophy contains so much 
of the spiritual element that those who 
study it deeply are, as our United States 
Commissioner of Education once said, 
" constantly growing in insight and power 
of achievement." 

For the sake of the fulness of develop- 
ment which it brings to the whole nature, 
we would make kindergarten training a 
part of every woman's education ; but it is 
never too late to begin a good movement, 
and if the mothers whose school-days are 
long over, and even the grandmothers who 
read these words, have never had an op- 
portunity to learn from Froebel, we would 
at once enroll them into classes, and urge 
them to engage in the study even if they 
have reached the advanced age of three- 
score and ten. 

Study Clubs of Mothers May be Organized 
In many small towns, villages, and 
sparsely settled neighbourhoods of the 

7 



The Kindergarten 

United States there are earnest women 
and true mothers eager and anxious to 
gain new light for the children's sake, but 
there is as yet no kindergarten, and there- 
fore no kindergartner who can serve as a 
leader in the study of Froebel. But let 
not that discourage us; .there is nothing 
we cannot get if we desire it sufficiently 
and are willing to wait for it, and the only 
thing needed here is one woman — just one 
— with sufficient energy, interest, and en- 
thusiasm to gather together a few of her 
neighbours and tell them her desires and the 
reasons for them. At this meeting, which 
may be entirely informal, a Study Club 
may be organized, without officers it may 
be, and without constitution or by-laws — 
simply a company of earnest women re- 
solved to know what the kindergarten can 
do for them, for their children, and for 
other people's children. 

There are various firms in this country 
devoted to the publication of educational 
literature, any one of which could give ad- 
vice as to the best books on the kindergar- 
ten, which, it should be explained, are for 
8 



In a Nutshell 

the use of a Study Club, and should not, 
therefore, be too technical in character. 

Perhaps it would be well, however, be- 
fore beginning upon books, to take up 
something briefer and more condensed, 
and for this purpose the so-called " Steiger 
tracts''* may be recommended. For a 
few cents apiece every member of the club 
might be supplied with a set of these leaf- 
lets, which could then be studied in com- 
mou. It might, perhaps, be well to appor- 
tion them among the members, requiring 
each person to study a certain one carefully 
at home, to become sufficiently familiar 
with its arguments to repeat them at the 
meeting, and be prepared to read and ex- 
plain the more important paragraphs. 
AVhen these are thoroughly digested other 
leaflets and essays may be obtained at 
trifling cost from publishing firms that 
make a specialty of kindergarten litera- 
ture, f 

* E. Steiger & Co., 25 Park Place, New York. 
Twenty-seven tracts for ten cents. 

f Kindergarten Literature Co., Woman's Tem- 
ple, Chicago, Illinois. 



The Kindergarten 

The Cooperation of Both Parents Needed 
Up to this time the mothers have done 
all the work in this neighbourhood enter- 
prise; they have taken the initiative, as it 
is their duty and their right to do in any 
social movement, especially one concerned 
primarily with the nurture and training 
of children, but we must remember that 
Froebel built his hopes for the regenera- 
tion of the human race on the evolution of 
the ideal family, and for that family two 
parents are needed. We have reached the 
stage where the cooperation of men is nec- 
essary and desirable, and we want to open 
their eyes to some of the new truths we 
have been considering. A general meet- 
ing for the whole community would now 
be advisable, the most effective readers and 
speakers in the Study Club being selected 
to present the various arguments for the 
kindergarten as a training for children and 
a study for women. This would, perhaps, 
be none too easy a task for a person unac- 
customed to public, or semi-public, speak- 
ing, but the members of such a club as we 
describe would, from the very circum- 
10 



In a Nutshell 

stances of the case, be neither dull, com- 
monplace, nor light-minded. If they were 
any of these things, it would never have 
occurred to them to begin the study of 
the kindergarten, or, having opened the 
door, they would have fainted on the 
threshold. 

Meetings to Study the Kindergarten 

The best results, in the awakening of 
public interest, may be expected to follow 
these general meetings, if successful, and 
they should be continued at regular inter- 
vals that men and women may keep pace 
in interest in and study of this new and 
vital question. It should be seen to, how- 
ever, that such gatherings do not become 
the dry and bloodless affairs which too 
often pose as educational conferences. The 
subject of education in itself is certainly a 
vitally interesting one to every thoughtful 
mind, both on its theoretical and its prac- 
tical sides, but there is nothing about which 
people can so prose if they are allowed, and 
about which they can present such tiresome 
arrays of cut-and-dried statements, worn- 
11 



The Kindergarten 

out facts, and trite reflections. Let us 
have the programmes of our neighbourhood 
meetings brief and bright, then, that our 
masculine guests be not overwearied in 
spirit ere the race is fairly begun. We score 
one point in the beginning, perhaps, for un- 
less enthusiasm over one's specialty clouds 
the judgment, there is a shade more interest 
in the kindergarten among people gener- 
ally than in other stages of early education. 
There seems, at least, to be much greater 
warmth of feeling, both for and against the 
system, much more readable literature on 
the subject, and a larger attendance on 
public kindergarten conferences than can 
be claimed by those interested in primary 
school work, for instance. Whether this 
is caused by the fervency of spirit of the 
kindergartner, the arresting and compel- 
ling nature of Froebel's philosophy, or the 
superior attractions of the very little child 
we need not attempt to decide, but we may 
thankfully accept the fact, if indeed it be 
one, and rejoice in any happy circumstance 
which gives to men a more intimate knowl- 
edge of the younglings of the flock, with 
12 



In a Nutshell 

whom, from the nature of tilings, they 
come so little in contact. 

The Kindergarten Bible Must be Studied 
When the leaflets mentioned ahove have 
heen thoroughly studied it is time to begin 
the reading and discussion of books upon 
the kindergarten, and full, descriptive cat- 
alogues of the most helpful among these 
volumes can easily be obtained from edu- 
cational publishers. Whatever else is used 
or neglected, however, Froebel's " Mother- 
Play " (Afutter-und-Kose- Lieder), the kin- 
dergarten Bible, must first be taken up and 
read, studied, discussed, thought upon, and 
pondered over, till the truths it holds have 
taken root in heart and life. The book is 
absolutely unique in literature; it had no 
predecessors and has had no descendants; 
therefore it may well be that some things 
about it will at first strike the reader as 
vaguely metaphysical, or out of proportion, 
or sentimental, or overwrought — even, per- 
haps, as grotesque. But withhold your 
judgment, turn its pages with open mind 
and reverent spirit, and by and by. in com- 



The Kindergarten 

pany with all true-hearted women who have 
ever read it seriously, you will acknowl- 
edge it as an interpreter of life and a key to 
its problems. 

There are now three magazines in the 
United States devoted to the kindergarten, 
and each one of these is either conducting 
a course in the study of the " Mother- 
Play," or giving comments upon the book 
with original illustrative poems. Any or 
all of these magazines would be found most 
helpful, both on the theoretical and practi- 
cal sides of kindergarten work, and Study 
Clubs might subscribe to at least two, if not 
all three of them, and constantly use them 
for private study and general discussion. 

Practical Work 
As the work of the Clubs progresses 
from the general to the particular, in the 
order to be suggested in this handbook, 
taking up in succession the various in- 
strumentalities of education used in the 
kindergarten — gifts, occupations, songs, 
plays, and stories — it is supposed that the 
members will give as much time and study 
14 



In ca Nutshell 

as they find possible both to the book itself, 
to the leaflets recommended, and to kin- 
dergarten literature in general. When the 
simple course of study is finished its fol- 
lowers will have taken only the first steps 
in kindergarten training, but it may be 
that one among them will feel that she has 
gained enough knowledge to make a tenta- 
tive beginning in teaching the neighbour- 
hood children. 

If she can and will gather them together 
for two or three hours every morning, and 
with the help and advice of other members 
of the club try the practical application of 
some of the principles they have been 
studying, it is probable, if she loves and 
understands children, that an encouraging 
degree of success will attend her labours. 
She could do no harm, at least, with some 
of the Froebel occupations — sewing, weav- 
ing, and modelling in clay, for instance; 
she could delight her little pupils with sim- 
ple talks and stories, and if she had any 
musical ability she could teach them some 
of the standard kindergarten songs and 
plays. 

15 



The Kindergarten 

Care in Selecting the Kindergartner 
It may be, if the community is large 
enough, that this modest beginning, her- 
alded by those eager missionaries, the chil- 
dren, will awaken so much interest that 
the services of a trained kindergartner can 
be engaged. Let much wisdom and dis- 
cretion be employed in selecting this kin- 
dergartner, and let it be understood that 
she must be not only a graduate of a good 
training school, but a good woman also, one 
whose heart and soul have been awakened, 
as well as her mind instructed, in the truth 
as it is in Froebel. 

It has been often said, so often that we 
weary at the sound, that character-build- 
ing is and should be the essential aim of 
education, but it is, unfortunately, the ten- 
dency of truth to become truism. The 
fact that two and two make four was 
doubtless familiar to Noah, and imparted 
by the object-lesson method to Shem, Ham, 
and Japhet in the ark, but the knowledge 
is just as useful to-day, and must be taught, 
explained, and illustrated to people if they 
have not discovered it for themselves. 
16 



In a Nutshell 

We cannot insist too much upon the 
truth that he who has never builded 
character for himself can hardly be ex- 
pected to build it in others, and it is for 
this reason that the personality of the 
kindergartner is so all-important a mat- 
ter. It is as Stevenson said: "A spirit 
communicated is a perpetual possession. 
These best teachers climb beyond teach- 
ing to the plane of art ; it is themselves 
and what is best in themselves that they 
communicate." 

Cooperation in this kindergarten work 
need not of course be confined to the 
parents of the community, for any one in- 
terested in education may, by the payment 
of a subscription, secure the admission of 
a little protege, the expenses of whose tui- 
tion could not otherwise be met. It would 
be easy, too, to interest the church in the 
work — for it can be clearly proved that 
there is no better missionary enterprise — 
and persuade it to contribute to the sup- 
port of the new movement or furnish, if 
nothing more, a room where the children 
may be gathered. 

2 17 



The Kindergarten 

Where the Neighbourhood is Large Enough 
If the neighbourhood is large enough to 
have a public school building, and there is 
an unused room therein, the authorities 
may j^erhaps be willing to lend it to the 
kindergarten, and here, side by side with 
the primary school, is really its ideal loca- 
tion, both because it is thus related to pub- 
lic education, of which it forms the initial 
stage, and because the older children may 
then easily serve as escorts and guardians 
to their younger brothers and sisters. 

There is nothing more valuable to neigh- 
bourhood life than a kindergarten — no, not 
even the church itself, of whose work it 
should always be a part. It supplies a 
centre for social activity, a nucleus around 
which may gather some of the best and 
highest interests of the community. It is 
folly to think, if you are childless, that 
you have no concern in the matter, for it 
is one of general interest, and is the busi- 
ness of every public-spirited man and 
woman. You might as well refuse to give 
your support to the almshouse because 
none of your relatives are indigent, or deny 
18 



In a Nutshell 

the necessity of a public library because 
yon happen to be blind. 

The kindergarten is most valuable to the 
life of to-day because of the social training- 
it gives. There is great danger in isolat- 
ing children and in bringing them up too 
exclusively in the company of grown peo- 
ple. They need the society of their equals 
as much as we who are older, and they 
must learn by absolute contact with their 
fellows the interdependence of all life, and 
the fact that we are members one of an- 
other. Every exercise of the kindergarten 
is of a social nature, and the child is only 
separated from his playmates when he has 
transgressed the laws which teach that the 
pursuit of his own happiness and the en- 
joyment of his own liberty are dependent 
upon his allowing the same rights to his 
companions. 

Cultivating the Child's Religious Nature 
The kindergarten, too, cultivates the re- 
ligious nature in a manner suitable to child- 
hood, and the principles on which this 
training is based need no interpretation by 
19 



The Kindergarten 

a kindergartner, but can be understood 
and developed by any thoughtful, earnest 
woman. This religious nurture has noth- 
ing whatever to do with sects, and need 
not be objected to by Buddhist, Brahmin, 
Confucian, or Hebrew, by no one, in fact, 
save the atheist, for it is an awakening of 
the spiritual nature, a development of the 
powers of love, reverence and aspiration, 
and a turning of the soul toward God, as 
the flower to the sun. 

Froebel also believed that the child 
should be led to the love and appreciation 
of Nature and the life of Nature by the 
care and protection of pet animals, the 
sowing of seeds, the tending of plants, and 
the gathering of their fruits and flowers, 
and this province of kindergarten work is 
obviously within the power of any intelli- 
gent person to conduct, and furnishes a 
most important part of the training of 
children. 

All these things, so feeble in the telling, 

so mighty in the working, are within your 

reach, dear women, everywhere. You need 

but to stretch out your hands and they are 

20 



In a Nutshell 

yours and your children's. If for their 
sakes you will give yourselves to the study 
of the kindergarten the next generation 
will indeed begin the history of the world 
anew. 



21 



The Kindergarten 
CHAPTER II 

WHAT SHALL WE PLAY WITn ? 

There is, perhaps, no educational opin- 
ion which is more firmly fixed in the pop- 
ular mind than that the earlier a child is 
taught to read the more it will redound to 
his present good, to his future glory, and 
to the welfare of his country; and there is 
certainly no other belief of its size and en- 
during quality which is, on the whole, 
more pernicious. 

It is passing away, no doubt, especially 
among thinking people, but not so fast 
that it does not still form a stumbling- 
block in the path of the much-enduring 
kindergartner. We are credibly informed 
that many of our New England progeni- 
tors at the beginning of this century could 
read the Bible with comparative fluency at 
three years of age, but although properly 
astonished at the impressive fact, we can- 
not help feeling that we should probably 
22 



In a Nutshell 

have been able to carry on the study of the 
good Book a little later if our ancestors had 
not begun with it so early, and we question 
whether the brain force of the children 
might not have been better able to cope 
with the tasks of to-day if their fathers and 
mothers had studied things more, and 
words less, in the past. 

Children Must Learn the Alphabet of Things 
Froebel said, and many great teachers 
before and after him have expressed the 
same thought, that the A B C of things 
must precede the A B C of words, and give 
to the words their true foundations, which 
means, being interpreted) that we must 
know the alphabet of things, so that we can 
begin to spell out the world a little, before 
we are set to learn book lessons. 

There is little that is valuable or life-giv- 
ing in the ordinary primer and first reader 
of the schools; there is little that appeals 
to the interest of the child in vowel sounds 
and diacritical marks, and he can very well 
afford to defer the dramatic interest of tales 
concerning the cat, the mat, and the rat, 
23 



The Kindergarten 

the fan, the pan, and the man, until a time 
when he can pass over them more quickly, 
regarding them not as ends in themselves, 
but as stepping-stones to something better. 
The first six years of life are all too short 
for what is to be learned in them outside 
of the domain of book-knowledge, and 
upon the depth, the strength, the extent, 
and the wholesomeness of these early im- 
pressions depend the depth, the strength, 
the extent, and the wholesomeness of later 
knowledge and being. 

Froebel believed that the child should 
be taught the full use of the members of 
his body and of his senses, that his faculty 
of speech should be trained, the powers of 
his mind and heart somewhat developed 
by the study of the things about him and 
their relations to himself, before he was in- 
troduced to the conventional learning of 
the schools — that is, to dealing with signs 
and symbols for things instead of the things 
themselves. He therefore worked out a 
connected series of objects which we call 
the gifts — legacies he bestowed upon the 
children of mankind, which it was his be- 
24 



In a Nutshell 

lief would, if properly used, not only give 
all the* preliminary ideas necessary to the 
understanding of concrete things, but lay 
the foundation for abstract knowledge also. 
This is teaching by means of objects, you 
say, and is certainly nothing new. Quite 
true; it is as old as the Garden of Eden, 
but though the idea itself may be old, there 
are inspired novelties in the manner of its 
presentation. 

How the Child is Taught to Use the Gifts 
What clear conceptions must the child 
have before he can understand even so sim- 
ple an object as his rubber ball : what do 
his experiments from the time he is able 
to "take notice" show that he is trying 
to find out? 

First, such large general facts as form, 
colour, motion, size, material, direction, po- 
sition, and, a little later perhaps, number, 
weight, dimension, and divisibility. He 
would doubtless discover all these things 
eventually if left to himself and given full 
liberty to experiment, but we claim that 
the objects called the kindergarten gifts 



The Kindergarten 



&' 



give him the required knowledge in less 
time and in an orderly manner. They be- 
gin with solids, represented first by woollen 
balls, then wooden balls, cubes, and cylin- 
ders, and larger wooden cubes divided in 
various ways; next progress to surfaces, or 
thin tablets of wood or pasteboard of va- 
rious shapes ; then to lines, straight and 
curved, shown by sticks of different lengths 
and metal rings, and end in points, which 
may be pebbles, shells, or such seeds as 
beans, lentils, coffee berries, or corn. The 
materials of the gifts are all simple enough, 
you see, but the idea at the foundation is 
masterly; for you will perceive, if you ex- 
amine the series, that it is so arranged as to 
give the child all the conceptions he needs 
for understanding the objects of the world 
about him. Not only this, but they are all 
connected one with the other; there is an 
orderly progression in them, which begets 
in the mind a habit of seeing things in their 
right relations and interdependent, as they 
are in life. 



26 



In a Nutshell 

Arguments for and against the Gifts 
The gifts, as they now exist, were care- 
fully worked out by Froebel after years of 
experiment, and are the result, not only 
of a thorough understanding of childish 
needs and desires, but of a deep knowledge 
of the sciences, notably of geometry and 
crystallography, in which he was particu- 
larly proficient. They do not represent a 
finality as they stand at present; indeed 
many suggestions as to their extension and 
improvement have already been made, 
though not yet universally adopted. It is 
claimed, for instance, and this, impartially 
considered, seems to be one of the strong- 
est objections to them, that they are not 
large enough in their present form to give 
complete pleasure to the child, and that 
their size, or want of it, renders the work 
at once too petty and too much of a strain 
upon the nervous activities in arrange- 
ment, balance, etc. Kindergartners are 
now everywhere making experiments with 
the larger blocks, which can already be had 
at any kindergarten supply store, and defi- 
nite conclusions will doubtless soon be 

9/7 



The Kindergarten 

reached as to their superiority in a physio- 
logical point of view and their supposedly 
greater attractions to the child. 

Experiments are also being made on ad- 
ditions to the chain of objects as ordinarily 
presented, on new blocks and figures which 
shall supplement those in nse and render 
the series more complete. Many of these 
changes Froebel himself suggested, though 
he did not fully work them out, and the 
present agitation on these subjects marks 
a healthy condition in the kindergarten 
world, a feeling that 

" He must upward be and onward 
Who would keep abreast of truth." 

The Gifts Appeal at Once to the Child 
It is our province, however, in this little 
manual, to consider the gifts as they are at 
present, not as they may be, or perhaps 
some time will be, and one of the most in- 
teresting things about this series of ob- 
jects is the way in which they are used. 

They would appeal at once to any child 
who saw them laid out upon a table, as 
being most appropriate and delightful 
28 



In a Nutshell 

playthings; they would so appeal to most 
ad nits, probably, and grown-up lingers 
would stretch out instinctively to the 
bright colours, the smooth surfaces, the 
shining steel, the deftly divided blocks, 
the fascinating bits of cardboard, the 
shapely geometric figures. " Why, this 
will bounce, and that will roll, and these 
will build houses, and these roofs, and these 
pillars," cries the child; "and here are 
pretty colours and shapes to make kaleido- 
scope figures, and here rings and bright 
sticks to lay pictures on the table! " 

This is the result of the first glance 
merely, of a cursory examination, for only 
extended study and experience can tell 
what these simple objects, if rightly used, 
can do for the whole being of the child. 

If we think only of the intellectual value 
of these playthings, we see that by the use 
of the first (six worsted balls) the pupil 
cannot help gaining an idea of colour, 
form, and material, and, by the various 
plays connected with it, motion, direction, 
and position. 

With the second (wooden sphere, cube, 
29 



The Kindergarten 



& 



and cylinder), form is even more strongly 
accentuated because of the contrasts shown ; 
material is noticed, number introduced, 
and the reasons for rest as well as motion 
dwelt upon. 

Next come the building gifts, third, 
fourth, fifth, and sixth (wooden cubes of 
two sizes, cut in various ways), and here 
enter, of necessity, great varieties of form, 
size, dimension, relation, position, divisi- 
bility, and an extended knowledge of num- 
ber, progressing as far as fractions. 

The Child Soon Learns to Investigate 
The chief joy of these cubes to the child 
is the opportunity they afford him for 
investigation, for the satisfaction of his 
healthy desire to take things apart and put 
them together again. He can divide the 
blocks to his heart's content and find out 
how " the wheels go wound," and he can 
build them up again into all sorts of forms, 
and thus gratify his imagination and his 
constructive instinct. It is because we give 
the little one no opportunity to build up 
that he is so prone to destroy. He has no 
30 



In a Nutshell 

evil desire to tear tilings to pieces, merely 
for the joy of destruction; he would far 
rather be a maker, a doer, a creator, if 
opportunity were given him — witness the 
intense childish joy in Robinson Crusoe 
and his achievements, and the longing 
that springs in every youthful breast to 
share that hero's unexampled advantages. 
The baby of three or four years feels the 
same longing in the bud, as it were, 
and these divided blocks assist him to 
gratify it. 

With the seventh gift the child begins to 
work with plane surfaces, using circular, 
square, and triangular tablets of wood or 
pasteboard, both coloured and uncoloured. 
There is an admirable opportunity here 
for gaining knowledge about plane geom- 
etry both in the forms themselves and in 
combination, and further experiment with 
colours is made possible. 

Then come straight lines (sticks of the 
eighth gift), curved lines (metal rings of 
the ninth), and the points of the tenth 
gift, gradually eliminating one dimension 
after another, or approximating thereto, 
31 



The Kindergarten 

putting off the body and taking n the 
spirit, as it were. 

Invention 
During the entire time the child is using 
tliis connected series of objects he is en- 
couraged to make something new with each 
one, something which shall be all his own, 
and this insistence upon invention is a dis- 
tinctive feature of the kindergarten. He 
is never to be content with the examination 
and study of his blocks, not even to be con- 
tent with following the suggestions and 
directions which the kindergartner gives 
for building, but when this is over he is to 
make something himself, either a copy of 
an object connected with his daily life or a 
symmetrical figure that pleases his fancy. 
Man is only of value, says the kindergar- 
ten (and herein it differs from any other 
system of object-teaching), as he is en- 
abled to become a useful, productive 
member of society, and to that end his 
individuality and his power of self-expres- 
sion must be fostered from the beginning 
of life. 

82 



In a Nutshell 

The Gift-Plays Train the Faculties 
All the gift-plays, too, train the faculty 
of speech, for there is constant question 
and answer, comment and observation 
while using them. Pleasant incidents and 
stories are told also, and the child is en- 
couraged to express his own ideas and fan- 
cies as far as his small powers admit. This 
procedure develops the imagination, so 
strong a power in childhood and so valua- 
ble a factor in mental and spiritual growth, 
and turns it into a useful channel. 

We are accustomed to say that the kin- 
dergarten is a school of the moralities, and 
no one can watch a group o£ children at 
work with the gifts without noting that 
the ordinary, humdrum but useful virtues 
of industry, economy, perseverance, and 
carefulness are in close attendance upon 
each small worker, and that he cannot dis- 
pense with their aid. However skeptical 
one may be as to the value of these objects 
in general, he cannot fail to acknowledge 
their worth as a preparation for later school 
work, and practical, hard-headed persons, 
who are disposed to think there must be 
3 33 



The Kindergarten 

something wrong with the kindergarten be- 
cause it is so agreeable to the child, are often 
converted when they are made to see how 
perfectly the form and number work pre- 
joare for geometry and arithmetic; how the 
training of the hand in the various employ- 
ments makes writing a simple matter, and 
how the constant education of the eye in 
dealing with distances, spaces, and lengths, 
judging and comparing differing lines, an- 
gles, and designs, is an absolute prepara- 
tion for learning to read. If the limits of 
a handbook admitted, a great deal might 
be said as to the bearing of the gifts on 
more advanced studies, of the side-lights 
they give on philosophy and architecture, 
of the special way in which they address 
the judgment and the reasoning faculty, 
and a volume might easily be written on 
their connection with the arts and indus- 
tries. 

All these subjects, however, can only be 
suggested here in the hope that the Study 
Clubs, projected in the first chapter, may 
take them as texts for sermons which ex- 
perience will enable them to write, and 



In a Nutshell 

which they can use for the awakening of 
enthusiasm in the community of which 
they form a part. 

The Motto of the Kindergarten Gifts 
One more word on a supremely valuable 
feature of the gift exercises must he said 
just here, however, and that is on the op- 
portunity they offer for concerted action. 
If the kindergartner or mother who con- 
ducts them allows each child to work alone, 
intent upon the perfecting of his own de- 
sires, without thought for others, without 
consideration of the common welfare, she 
neglects the highest opportunity for good 
which any system of education can offer. 

The "together spirit" is the key-note 
of the age, not less than the motto of the 
American people; and Froebel shows his 
wonderful foresight, his prescience of the 
needs of a coming time, when he makes 
provision for cooperation even in the play- 
work he devised for the veriest babies. 
Whether they build a village together, 
whether they mass their sticks or tablets 
to form a common design, whether they 



The Kindergarten 



&> 



con struct something to please the smaller 
children, who are not so deft in handling 
the material, whether they combine their 
taste and skill in decorating the room, still 
this thought, " Each for all, and all for 
•each," must constantly be kept in mind if 
kindergarten Avork is really to develop the 
spiritual nature of the child and prepare 
him for ideal citizenship, as it claims to 
do.* 

Gifts Which May be Used at Home 

The question is often asked whether 
these playthings may be used in the home, 
and which of them are best adapted to the 
purpose. To begin with, the first gift (six 
soft worsted balls in the colours of the spec- 
trum — red, yellow, blue, green, orange, 
and violet) was intended by Froebel for 
nursery use, and he gives in the " Peda- 
gogics of the Kindergarten " and in his 
" Letters " many wise and practical sug- 
gestions for dealing with it. There are 
many ball plays, too, outlined in the kin- 

* Practical suggestions for group work under 
each gift and each occupation are to be found in 
"The Republic of Childhood," Vols. I and II. 
00 



In a Nutshell 

dergarten guides, and any intelligent 
mother who has the true play spirit can 
adapt the exercises to her own conditions 
and her personal needs. 

Lessons in Form and Colour 
The second gift (wooden sphere, cube, 
and cylinder) requires somewhat more work 
and thought to make it useful and inter- 
esting, though all children are delighted 
with the plays which show the three forms 
whirling on their different axes, disclosing 
surprises in the shape of new geometric fig- 
ures revolving within. Then there are the 
second gift beads — tiny wooden reproduc- 
tions of the three type-forms (coloured and 
uncoloured) — which furnish delightful 
nursery occupations, assorting them ac- 
cording to form and colour, stringing them 
on stout shoe-laces in various ways, and us- 
ing them, with sticks thrust through their 
holes, for soldiers, and children, and fence- 
posts, and trees, and telegraph poles, and 
what not. 

For the building-blocks, the sticks, the 
rings, and the points, tables are necessary, 
37 



The Kindergarten 

either marked off in inch squares, or cov- 
ered with squared oilcloth, which may be 
bought at the kindergarten supply stores. 
The fifth, sixth, and seventh gifts are much 
more difficult than the others, and contain 
such wonderful capabilities for building 
and advanced geometrical work that it 
would be best, perhaps, to leave them to the 
management of a trained kindergartner. 

The cubes and bricks of the first two 
building gifts, the eighth, ninth, and tenth 
gifts (sticks, rings, and points), may very 
well be used in the nursery in simple exer- 
cises, manifold suggestions for which may 
be found in all technical books on the 
kindergarten. All these objects are inex- 
pensive, but the balls may easily be made 
at home, a sample set being purchased to 
show the size and exact colours ; the 
sphere, cube, and cylinder may be turned 
out by any man who can use a lathe if 
the requisite dimensions are given, and 
even the cubes and bricks of the third and 
fourth gifts may be made by the father of 
the family if he is a good tool-worker. 

All these blocks must be thoroughly well 
38 



In a Nutshell 

made, however; the proportions muse te 
perfect and the surfaces carefully finished, 
or there will be great difficulty of balance 
and consequent distress when the children 
are using them. More than this, exact- 
ness and accuracy are insisted upon in 
every kindergarten exercise, and it would 
be impossible to require them of the pupils 
unless exact and accurate materials were 
furnished. 

The results from the gift work will un- 
doubtedly be much more satisfactory if it 
is conducted by a good kindergartner ; but 
if the organisation of a kindergarten is a 
matter which must be left until there is 
sufficient public interest to demand one, 
the children of the neighbourhood need not 
therefore be deprived of all the advantages 
which come from this cunningly devised 
series of objects. 

The members of the Study Club must 
take up the gifts and give them serious and 
thoughtful attention; each little object, no 
matter how trifling it may seem, must be 
considered not only in itself but in its re- 
lation to what has preceded and what will 
39 



The Kindergarten 

follow it; there must be clear understand- 
ing of its special uses and of its worth to 
the Child, or little good can come of its 
employment. 

All the students, whether they are to 
use them at home or not, should handle 
and become familiar with the objects, 
should follow sequences and dictations and 
devise new figures and combinations with 
the different materials. That was a wise 
remark of Lord Bacon's, that it takes much 
knowledge and wisdom to impart the right 
little successfully, and it is of application 
here. 

Introduce the Gifts Step by Step 

Finally, if the gifts are employed in the 
nursery, see to it that they are introduced 
consecutively, step by step, never taking 
up a new object until a fair knowledge of 
the last one has been gained, and then 
using the two together for a season; see to 
it that each day's play has a purpose be- 
hind it, and is both hand-work and head- 
work, not the former alone; reserve a 
special time for using the playthings, and, 
lest too great familiarity breed contempt, 
40 



In a Nutshell 

have them put away carefully when the 
period has expired; insist, also, that the 
building-blocks be put together into their 
original form before the box is turned over 
them, and the balls, beads, sticks, and 
rings laid neatly in their trays or baskets. 

Remember also, though the children may 
be busy with the materials, that there is a 
great deal of difference, as Froebel says, 
between " free creative activity and aim- 
less, purposeless activity," and strive for 
the busyness of the squirrel storing nuts 
for the winter, rather than the restless 
energy of the same creature madly flying 
around his wheel. 

And one more thing remember, that it 
is in these baby exercises that we are sup- 
posed to be forming habits of concentration 
and attention, and to this end we must see 
to it, before we begin upon them, that every 
child is ready to hear and to do, that he 
has his mind fixed on the thing in hand, 
and that he devotes himself absolutely to 
the brief play, whatever it may be, so long 
as it continues. 

These are the minor things to remem- 
41 



The Kindergarten 

ber, if anything may be counted minor in 
these matters, and the major are that the 
gifts shall be so used that not only the 
physical powers may be developed and the 
mental faculties trained, but the spiritual 
nature addressed and the whole human 
creature given a little upward impetus to- 
ward those things that are pure, those 
things that are lovely and of good report. 



42 



In a Nutshell 
CHAPTER III 

WHAT SHALL WE MAKE? 

Do you remember, when you were a 
child, the pastimes you delighted in ? Do 
you remember making sand-pies, pricking 
holes in paper, stringing seeds and flowers 
and nuts, plaiting book-marks and May- 
baskets, folding pussy-cat stairs, playing 
cat's cradle, drawing pictures with slate 
and lead pencil, cutting out figures, sew- 
ing on stray bits of cloth with your thread 
tied into your needle ? Do you remember 
all these things, and, as you read them over, 
do they not recall to you happy summer 
mornings out of doors, busy rainy days by 
mother's side, and bright, firelit evenings 
when you watched in delighted admiration 
father's skilful fingers as he fashioned 
stars and rosettes, and paper caps and fly- 
traps, and boats that would sail ? 

If you have not forgotten, if you can 
look back into the past and see again that 
43 



The Kindergarten 

child of long ago, can recall his thoughts 
and feel his heart-throbs, then, and only 
then, can you fully appreciate the happi- 
ness which the kindergarten occupations 
bring to the child of to-day. They are 
founded on the old pastimes, those which 
are more or less familiar to the children of 
every civilised country ; and Froebel gath- 
ered them up from his own recollections 
and from his close observation of simple 
German family life, and transferred them 
to the kindergarten. There he systema- 
tised them, cut out those of little educa- 
tional value, arranged them in consecutive 
order, pruned here, introduced new feat- 
ures there, supplied a missing link in an- 
other place, until, after years of experiment, 
he had a complete series of occupations 
based not only on the traditional employ- 
ments of children, but — and this is a note- 
worthy fact — on the primitive arts and in- 
dustries of mankind. Drawn from such a 
source, arranged by so wise a thinker, so 
sympathetic and skilled an observer of 
children, it is no wonder that the occupa- 
tions seem absolutely to fit every need and 
44 



In a Nutshell 

every desire of the little people of the kin- 
dergarten. 

They stand, as Froebel left them, in the 
following order, some, of course, being of 
much more importance than others and 
some being little used to-day. 

The Kindergarten Occupations Explained 

The occupation of pricking or perforat- 
ing is the outlining of objects, the making 
of lines, angles, and geometrical forms on 
paper or cardboard by means of a stout 
needle set in a wooden handle. 

In sewing, with a blunt needle and 
worsteds of appropriate colour, the child 
outlines objects, lines, or pictures which 
have been transferred to cardboard and 
perforated at proper intervals. 

Kindergarten drawing is of several kinds : 
the making of lines, angles, and figures on 
checkered slates and paper; the tracing 
around cardboard patterns — a thing which 
children always enjoy, and the purely free- 
hand work, or what one might call the first 
steps in sketching from Nature. 

For paper-interlacing, which is rather a 
45 



The Kindergarten 

uimcult employment, bright coloured strips 
a quarter of an incli or more in width and 
a foot or so long are provided. They are 
then doubled once, twice, or thrice their 
entire length and folded into symmetrical 
figures, into which, when completed, other 
or similar figures are intertwined, produc- 
ing charming designs. 

For slat-interlacing, thin strips of any 
tough wood half an inch wide and about 
ten inches long are used. At least four 
slats are needed to make a complete figure 
which will hold together without pasting 
or sewing, but many times this number 
may be used, and by the employment of 
different lengths and widths of slats, and 
varying combinations, the figures may be 
made very pretty and even serviceable. 

Weaving, Paper Cutting and Folding 
In weaving, the child is given a square 
or oblong mat of bright paper cut in strips 
from one-half to one-eighth of an inch in 
width, as desired, and, fastening other 
strips of harmonising or contrasting colours 
into a long steel needle, he runs them into 
46 



In a Nutshell 

the mat, producing innumerable charming 
patterns, which vary according to the nu- 
merical combinations he uses. 

The name paper-cutting is self-explana- 
tory, although the work in the kindergar- 
ten includes not only cutting out pictures, 
but dividing squares, triangles, and circles 
according to a regular system, and making 
designs with the pieces. 

In paper-folding, the boats and boxes and 
pin-wheels of long ago are made, and also 
a great quantity of flat and symmetrical 
figures which are produced by very slight 
changes from a regular ground-form. 

Peas-Work and Clay-Modelling 
The peas-work is really delightful, though 
not at all easy, except in its first steps. 
Slender, pointed sticks are used, and peas 
which have been soaked over night ; and 
connecting the former by the latter, skele- 
tons of geometrical solids, and of all kinds 
of playthings, as tools, carts, houses, and 
furniture, are very easily made. 

Last comes the modelling in clay, which 
needs no description — merely a word of 
47 



The Kindergarten 

tribute to the genius who saw in this dear 
delight of children a means of intellectual 
development. 

These are the principal kindergarten 
occupations. There are others — notably 
bead-stringing, chain-making, cardboard- 
modelling, rolled strip- work,and the thread 
game ; and then there is the sand-work, 
which is so important as really to deserve 
a paper by itself. 

Relation of the Occupations to the Gifts 
It will be seen, as soon as we begin to 
study the occupations, that they are closely 
related to the gifts, using much the same 
materials, illustrating the same progression 
(although in the opposite direction) from 
point to line, line to plane, and plane to 
solid, laying the same stress upon relations 
of form and number, cultivating some of 
the same virtues, and giving the same wide 
opportunities for individual work or inven- 
tion. Still there are marked differences 
between them, prominent among which is 
that the gift material undergoes no essen- 
tial change when used, while change is the 
48 



In a Nutshell 

first requisite in dealing with the occupa- 
tions. We may take the blocks apart and 
employ them as we like, but at the close 
of the play they are always returned to the 
original shape; in the occupation of fold- 
ing, on the other hand, we begin to modify 
the square, and to bend it into something 
else as soon as we take it in our hands. 

Another marked point of difference is 
that the ideas received through the gifts 
are commonly worked out through the oc- 
cupations — that is, impression in the one 
becomes expression in the other. 

It would be folly to attempt any com- 
parison between the respective values of 
the two series, for one is really the comple- 
ment of the other, and though they travel 
the same road, they travel it in different 
vehicles. It is easy to see, however, that 
most of the occupations may be handled 
with greater ease and simplicity than the 
gifts; that they are more akin to the em- 
ployments with which the mother natu- 
rally supplies her child, that they require 
somewhat less knowledge and skill in teach- 
ing, and that therefore she is less liable to 
4 49 



The Kinderearten 



e>" 



make mistakes in dealing with them. The 
gifts, it is probable, are positively harmful 
to the child if they are not handled in a 
definite, serious, purposeful way and with 
a knowledge of their possibilities; but some 
of the occupations may be conducted by a 
comparatively inexperienced person, and 
not only give great pleasure, but be really 
helpful in minor ways, at least. 

Changes in the Occupations 
It has been already said that the occupa- 
tions have undergone considerable modi- 
fication since Froebel's day, and many of 
them, like the gifts, are now the subject 
of experiment in various kindergarten 
centres. 

Pricking, for instance, on account of the 
eye-strain attendant upon it, is almost out 
of use; net- work drawing, both for the 
above reason and because it is supposed to 
be too mechanical and to lead to designing 
rather than to nature- work, is also passing 
away; the thread game, slat and paper in- 
terlacing, and peas-work are seldom seeu, 
and the tendency in all the remaining oc- 
50 



In a Nutshell 

cupations is toward larger size in materials, 
a larger scale in designing, and greater free- 
dom in expression. Much of this change 
has been rendered necessary by the in- 
creased knowledge which modern child- 
study has given us of the physical devel- 
opment of the child, and the danger of too 
early engaging him in work demanding 
great precision and dexterity, small move- 
ments and constant tension of the muscles 
of the eye. 

Some of the old-fashioned pastimes, how- 
ever, notably the thread game, slat and 
peas work, are most useful and delightful 
for the home and the nursery, if indeed 
their educational value is not supposed to 
warrant their admission to the school, and 
it is to be understood that the changes in 
the occupations, both present and future, 
are and probably will be, not in the line of 
superseding them altogether, but of modi- 
fying and changing them in accordance 
with recent discoveries in physiology and 
psychology. 



51 



The Kindergarten 

Kindergarten Work Trains the Hands 

And when they are developed to their 
fullest extent and managed as Froebel in- 
tended, what may we expect of them ? you 
ask. 

There is a much-used saying in the kin- 
dergarten that development according to 
Froebel is threefold — that is, it includes 
within its purpose something for the body, 
something for the soul, and something for 
the mind. We should expect, then, that 
the kindergarten occupations would effect 
something for the physical powers of the 
child, and we find that they train his arms 
and hands and fingers so that they become 
deft servants of his will, and not only the 
right hand, you understand, but the left, 
too, for the idea is to make him ambidex- 
trous. 

In securing these ends the mind receives 
development also, and the same thing is 
true of the eye-training, which is, of neces- 
sity, partly mental and partly physical. 

If we begin to discuss the intellectual 
value of the occupations a host of particu- 
52 



In a Nutshell 

lars rises before us, and in the first place 
we may as well disabuse ourselves of the 
too common impression that all these em- 
ployments are easy for the child, so easy 
that they are the merest baby-play, requir- 
ing no concentration nor perseverance, and 
therefore making but sorry preparation for 
the difficult work exacted in the school. 
The remark is made so often in conversa- 
tion, and is so often seen in print, that it 
has found lodgment in the juiblic mind, 
though indeed there is not as much truth 
in it as could be balanced on the point of 
a cambric needle. 

Kindergarten Work Also Trains the Mind 
Kindergarten work is always engrossing, 
delightful, and fascinating to the child, 
but it is by no means especially easy, and 
he who needs conviction on this point has 
but to give a half-hour's supervision to a 
class engaged with any one of the occupa- 
tions in order to find out his error and con- 
fess it with tears. The statement is boldly 
made, then, that the occupations demand 
great concentration and attention, that 
53 



The Kindergarten 

they also demand observation, and con- 
stantly require comparison and judgment. 
If these five faculties, and these alone, 
were developed by their means, we might 
be satisfied, but definite training in colour, 
form, number, and language is also in- 
separable from the work. As to the field 
for creative activity, it is so wide and so 
fully occupied by the children that the 
results can only be appreciated by those 
familiar with the kindergarten. Outsiders 
are commonly quite unwilling to believe 
that such and such designs presented for 
their approbation could possibly have been 
made by babies of five to six years, and 
hint that the kindergartner, like the old- 
fashioned drawing-master, must have sup- 
plied most of the finishing touches. 

The question is easily enough put to 
proof, however, for it is only necessary to 
allow a class free play with any of the ma- 
terials to see lovely results blossoming on 
every table without the least suggestion 
from older persons. And why should this 
not be so ? The seed was there, the kin- 
dergarten supplied the proper surround- 
54 



In a Nutshell 

ings for growth, and in due time the flower 
bloomed . 

Moral Bearing of the Occupations 
But let us talk together of the moral 
bearing of the occupations; let us note the 
perseverance, the neatness, the orderliness 
of each small worker; let us observe how 
careful and economical he is in the use of 
all material; let us admire his long-con- 
tinued patience in the face of difficulties, 
his self-restraint when failure makes fresh 
efforts necessary. In order to witness all 
these things in a majority of the children, 
one must, it is true, visit a really good kin- 
dergarten ; but what then ? Is not the 
ideal that for which we are all striving? 
Would it be of any value to describe to you 
what is less than the best ? 

These occupations, which are so well be- 
loved of childhood, are more useful even 
than the gifts for cooperative work. Here, 
for instance, the children are fitting up a 
doll-house, each contributing a portion of 
the furnishings; here they are combining 
their weaving-mats to make a border for 
55 



The Kindero-arten 



&■ 



the blackboard; here they are grouping 
their paper foldings for a large design to 
hang on the wall; here each one is model- 
ling a small clay sphere which he will after- 
ward paint, and thus a fine box of marbles 
will be provided for a sick playmate. In 
no case is the work allowed to be a selfish 
possession for one child alone; the joy in 
production and achievement is made to 
grow, as far as possible, from the thought 
that some one else is to be made happier 
thereby. 

Make a Neighbourhood Kindergarten 
Ah, you say in surprise, if these things 
be true what a storehouse of virtues and 
graces is here to be drawn upon; what in- 
telligent mother would dare to reject such 
riches for her children! Let her see to it, 
then, that each one of her brood receives 
his rightful share of the inheritance, and 
if he cannot be taken to the kindergarten 
let the kindergarten be brought to him. 

If there are four or five children within 
reach gather this handful together and 
make a neighbourhood child-garden; if you 
5G 



In a Nutshell 

live in a lighthouse and have only one 
child, still do what you can. Much may 
be accomplished even though the blessed 
influence of companionship is denied to 
your little one. 

If you are a member of one of the Study 
Clubs already suggested for those commu- 
nities too small to employ a kindergartner, 
it will be best for you to take up the oc- 
cupations in detail as a subject of serious 
attention. You can never hope that the 
child will accomplish anything worthy with 
them unless you know them yourself prac- 
tically as well as theoretically, and unless 
you recognise their difficulties and their 
possibilities. 

The Best Occupations for the Home 
There are a number of technical works 
on the occupations that the members of 
the clubs may study and read together, and 
there are plates included in some of them 
(and to be had separately also) which show 
the ordinary "schools of work" in each 
employment — that is, a systematic course, 
part or all of which the child is to follow, 



The Kindergarten 

but which is constantly to be diversified by 
original production. These schools may 
be studied and practised by older persons 
until they understand clearly the prelimi- 
nary steps to be taken in each branch of 
work and have had some experience in in- 
vention. 

The occupations best fitted for little 
children in the home — those which can be 
conducted with some success by a person 
untrained or self-trained in kindergarten 
work — are sewing, drawing, and painting, 
weaving, cutting, folding, peas-work, clay- 
modelling, bead-stringing, and chain-mak- 
ing. 

The last two of these are very simple and 
suitable for the merest babies, and so in- 
deed is modelling, although adapted as well 
to older children and to the adult.* 

Bead -stringing has always been a nursery 
pastime, but it is not advisable that very 
young children should use the tiny bits of 
glass generally provided for the purpose, 

* "The Republic of Childhood," Vol.11, con- 
tains, in each chapter upon the occupations, hints 
for home and school work, with all the materials. 

58 



In a Nutshell 

since there is some nervous strain in hand- 
ling the delicate needle and thread which 
are requisite, and in rinding the small open- 
ing in the bead. 

The larger glass or porcelain beads, either 
round or cylindrical, which are made in 
Germany in great quantities, are suitable 
for stringing, and so are the wooden kin- 
dergarten beads — spheres, cubes, and cyl- 
inders. A stout cord, wire, or shoe-lace 
is to be preferred for the exercise, and it 
is to be remembered that some sequence, or 
arrangement in number, colour, or form, 
is to be emphasized, or the work will re- 
main only finger- work. 

Chain-making, which is merely the past- 
ing together in link form of strips of col- 
oured paper two inches long perhaps and 
one-third inch wide, is always enjoyed by 
babies, and so are the daisy-chains made 
by alternately stringing bits of straw and 
paper; but it cannot be too much empha- 
sized that no faded colours, soiled and 
crumpled papers, or badly cut materials 
are to be used for this work. Everything 
must be fresh, bright, and dainty, or we 
59 



The Kindergarten 



& 



can hardly exact the same qualities from 
the finished product. 

Paper-tearing is something which all 
children delight in, and which can be 
made valuable as well as pleasant to them. 
They may first tear long strips of news- 
paper carefully, afterward using them fast- 
ened to a stick as fly-brooms, perhaps, and 
then, from more attractive paper, tear cir- 
cles, squares, and finally simple forms, 
such as houses, boats, and furniture. 

As to weaving, care must be taken not to 
use too finely cut papers; and it is as well 
to begin with oilcloth mats and wooden 
slats, passing from these, when the art is 
learned, to woollen mats and strips, which 
can be woven, still using the fingers, to 
make holders, mats, carpets for doll- 
houses, etc. Cane and rush weaving, for 
which manuals can be obtained, are excel- 
lent employments for older children, and 
if the connection of the employment with 
art and industry is to be understood, it is 
best that they should see a loom at work, 
and note the devices for unwinding the 
warp as it is taken up by the weaving, 
GO 



In a Nutshell 

and for raising and lowering alternate sets 
of strings as the wool or rags is passed 
through. Simple models of wooden looms 
are to be had, and are particularly useful 
for group work. 

Modelling in Clay 
The clay-modelling is the most valuable 
art material the kindergarten holds, per- 
haps, and one of the most universally at- 
tractive. It is really ideal work for little 
children, as it entails no strain on eye or 
fingers, is easily handled, pleasant to the 
touch, responsive to fancy, and adapted to 
making many objects of infantile desire in 
the way of balls, marbles, beads for string- 
ing, as well as the fashioning of geometri- 
cal forms, tea-sets, furniture, fruits, leaves, 
vegetables, flowers, and animals. Let no 
prejudice in regard to its dusty or soiling- 
qualities deter the mother from using it. 
The prejudice is, in fact, unfounded, for 
if the children are taught to be ordinarily 
neat, and if they use trays or oilcloth -cov- 
ered tables for their work, no harm is done 
to clothes or furniture, and, as for hands, 
61 



The Kindergarten 

no child but would willingly scrub them 
afterward to a lobster-like redness if he 
might but have the dear delight of this 
idealised mud-pie making. 

The more the mother or teacher knows 
of the possibilities and limitations of the 
clay, the greater will be her pupils' suc- 
cesses, of course; but no person of ordinary 
intelligence can conduct modelling with 
children without giving them great pleas- 
ure, and teaching them, and herself at the 
same time, many a useful lesson. 

For most of the remaining occupations 
considerable study and practice are un- 
doubtedly necessary, but so many helps in 
the work are now to be had that fair suc- 
cess may be expected if only the matter be 
given its full share of time and importance. 
The sewing cards may be made at home; 
the drawing materials are to be found in 
every nursery ; the colored paper for chains, 
for cutting, and for folding may be pre- 
pared by the mother if she is exact and 
careful and not averse to constant ruling 
and measuring, and it is a simple matter 
to mix the clay for moulding. The beads, 
G2 



In a Nutshell 

of course, must be bought, and so must 
the paper for the weaving, and, for that 
matter, so must all the other materials un- 
less they can be furnished fresh, accurately 
cut, correct and attractive in colour, and 
precise in measurement. 

Mothers Should Understand the Occupations 
It is certain that the mother who makes 
a determined effort to understand the kin- 
dergarten occupations herself, and to 
employ them for the benefit of her child, 
will be a thousand times repaid both in 
those things which she can see without 
effort and in those which she must take 
on trust. 

As to the visible benefits, she cannot help 
perceiving that they assist, like the gifts, 
in preparing for the studies of the school, 
that they form an admirable preparation 
for later work in the arts and industries, 
that they make the child more resourceful, 
more apt at amusing himself and provid- 
ing amusement for others, and, finally, that 
they not only assist in fostering the simple 
virtues and in forming habits of industry, 
63 



The Kindergarten 



& 



economy, and order, but give a mental 
training which will be of the greatest pos- 
sible service by and by, when the little one 
becomes a member of the world's great 
army of workers. 



64 



In a Nutshell 

CHAPTER IV 

nature's toys and pastimes 

The educational employments and pas- 
times which Froebel worked out or sug- 
gested are by no means confined to balls 
and blocks and sticks, or to designing, 
moulding, and manipulating bits of paper. 
He was too great a lover of Nature in all 
her moods and ways, had felt too keenly 
the wisdom, peace, and strength she gives 
her votaries, to be willing to omit her teach- 
ings from his ideal scheme of human de- 
velopment. Many things that he recom- 
mended, having to do with Nature and the 
life of Nature, have been passed over or 
neglected by the teacher, and largely be- 
cause the kindergarten in America has been 
so much a feature of crowded city life, has 
been so far removed from the ideal condi- 
tions in regard to space and situation, that 
care of and companionship with animals, 
for instance, or sowing the seed and tend- 
5 65 



The Kindergarten 

ing the plants, have been quite out of the 
question. 

Advantages of Country Life 
Here the women to whom this little 
handbook is chiefly addressed, those who 
live in the country or in villages and small 
towns away from the centres of civilisation, 
may exult in one of their great advantages, 
for their children have room enough to 
live and to grow in and to learn Nature's 
lessons at first hand. That such a life is 
an ideal one for the little child would be 
affirmed probably by every one who had 
lived it himself, and that it was so consid- 
ered by Froebel there is abundant testi- 
mony in the songs, text, and illustrations 
of the "Mother-Play." 

Children's Gardens 
Every child, if you would bring him up 
on kindergarten principles, should have 
his own garden, however small it may be, 
and should till it himself with such help 
in the heavier work as may be necessary. 
It should not be a thing granted for one 
66 



In a Nutshell 

summer and denied the next, as of little 
worth and much trouble, but should be of 
unfailing return like the seasons. Nor 
should the gardener have too much dicta- 
tion from older persons as to what he shall 
plant and how he shall arrange it, nor 
should it be commanded that he shall keep 
his vegetables and his flowers separate. 

If he thinks that he prefers sweet peas 
and onions growing side by side, let him 
have them so. Good taste is only a finer 
discrimination; and how are you, to dis- 
criminate without experience ? There is 
nothing more interesting than the miracle 
of growth, and no child but will watch 
with a passion of delight the stirring of the 
ground by the green shoots, their gradual 
emergence, strong and determined, push- 
ing aside all obstacles, to the light they 
love, their daily development of character- 
istics which mark their race inheritance, 
and finally their maturity and fruition. 
A great impression of the inevitable na- 
ture of cause and effect — a useful thing in 
education — comes to the child with the first 
perception that whatsoever a man soweth 
67 



The Kindergarten 

that shall he also reap, and that however 
ardently yoa may wish and pray for a crop 
of cabbages, it is all of no avail if you have 
not planted cabbage-seed. 

Lessons Learned by the Gardener 
All the lessons, too, which come to the 
gardener of the dependence upon him of 
his vegetable family are of a softening and 
developing kind . He must be patient with 
bad weather and slow growth, he must be 
watchful of foes within and without, he 
must keep back invading weeds, loosen the 
soil, and provide water when needful. The 
child only learns the first line of all these 
lessons, to be sure, and he requires a teacher 
for the task, but he is learning by doing, 
and that makes all the difference. 

City Prisoners 
If, on the other hand, your child be a 
prisoner of the city, the joys of gardening- 
need not be altogether denied to him, for 
if there is absolutely no earth-room, no 
tiny spot of hard ground that can be made 
productive, there are few dwelling-places 
68 



In a Nutshell 

where one may not have somewhere a large 
box of soil for the growing of a few hardy 
flowers and small vegetables. If even that 
be denied, there is always window garden- 
ing to do — sweet potatoes and carrots and 
parsnips to be hollowed ont and filled with 
water, sponges to sow with seed, bulbs to 
grow in glasses, and flowers to tend in pots 
and boxes. Anything so that we may have 
a garden — " that divine filter that filters all 
the grossness out of us, and leaves us, each 
time we have been in it, clearer and purer, 
and more harmless." 

Employments for Country Children 
In connection with and development 
from this gardening come a great many 
employments for the country child, or for 
him who has country holidays. Perhaps 
you know them already, or have you for- 
gotten them — the platted wreaths of leaves 
we used to make, the dandelion and daisy 
and lilac chains, and those charming ones 
of hollyhock buds, the poppy dollies, the 
furniture of burdock burrs, and the plump, 
prettily decorated sand and mud pies ? 
69 



The Kindergarten 

And here enter, too., most appropriately, 
drawing and painting from Nature — not 
landscapes, of course, but simple flowers, 
leaves, and fruit with which the children, 
because not too much fettered by rule, and 
by dint of loving the work, often attain 
surprisingly good results. 

Children Natural Collectors 
Children naturally delight in collecting, 
and they can easily be led to gather and 
press leaves and flowers and ferns and sea- 
moss, to seek out nuts and seeds and pods 
of various shapes and arrange them in 
boxes, and to pick up and classify small 
pebbles and shells and minerals. 

These collections, it must be owned, are 
often somewhat of a trial to the neat and 
careful housewife, but if they are confined 
within certain limits and not allowed to 
stray beyond them, they may well be borne, 
in view of their healthy effect upon the 
child. They keep him busy, and wisely 
busy, with things which are his natural 
playthings; they teach him discrimination, 
order, and classification, and they lead him 
70 



In a Nutshell 

to inexhaustible wonder at the treasures of 
the universe. 

" The world is so full of a number of things 
I'm sure we should all be as happy as kings,*' 

is the sweet, wholesome thought of every 
child who is learning from Nature. 

And when the seasons of growing and 
blooming and harvesting are over, the 
small collector finds that he has provided 
for himself delightful employments for the 
winter; for there are his stores to be ar- 
ranged and rearranged and re-rearranged 
ad infinitum, with ever fresh perceptions 
of their beauty and value; there is design- 
ing at the kindergarten tables with the 
glossy seeds and nuts and shining pebbles 
and delicate shells, and there are drawing 
and brush-work still to be continued from 
the treasures he has gathered in the long 
summer hours. 

Care of Pet Animals 

Just as clearly as Froebel traces in all 

his writings the path which the mother 

should follow in leading the child to a love 

71 



The Kindergarten 

and understanding of the plant and vege- 
table world, so he indicates the value to 
him of the care and companionship of ani- 
mals. One of the earliest songs in the 
"Mother- Play" is "Calling the Chickens," 
in which the baby in his mother's arms is 
taken to see the pretty feathered babies, 
and led to feel that they love him as much 
as he is drawn toward them. " Calling 
the Pigeons" follows, "The Fish in the 
Brook," " The Barnyard Gate," and other 
songs, each framed to give a different les- 
son. " The Barnyard Gate " is only a de- 
velopment of the practice common in every 
country of teaching the baby to imitate 
and distinguish between animal sounds — a 
practice so instinctive that the Indian 
mother in the far West and the Alaskan 
in her northern snows doubtless ask their 
pappooses what the coyote and the seal say, 
as naturally as we question, "What does 
the duck say, baby?" Froebel believes 
that the child often gets his first idea of 
motherly care and tenderness from the 
sight of a hen and chickens, or of a bird and 
her young, and that so he grows to see, as 
72 



In a Nutshell 

by reflected light, his own relation to the 
home-nest. 

If the child is so fortunate as to live in 
the country, or in country conditions, all 
this animal life is provided for him; if in 
a cramped city house, it is next door to im- 
possible that he should have it, save at the 
cost of pain and discomfort to the pets, a 
price which to pay would defeat the very 
object we are striving to attain. 

If they may not live by his side, he can 
at least be taken to see them, and here 
zoological gardens and parks stocked with 
sheep and deer, peacocks and swans, are of 
inestimable value if the child is allowed to 
see them quietly and at leisure, and to 
linger by those which interest him, and is 
not pulled about from one to the other at 
the will of his care-taker. You may not 
enjoy monkeys, for instance, and a brief 
glance in their all-too-human faces is even 
more than you desire, but you can be 
certain that your child will utterly fail to 
sympathise with your feelings, and may 
make up your mind to self-sacrifice in 
advance. 

73 



The Kindergarten 

Responsibility for Pets 

It is really not enough, however, merely 
to see these things: the ideal requires that 
the child take care of them, learn their 
likes and dislikes, and grow to feel his re- 
sponsibility as their providence. If he ac- 
cepts the charge of a bird, a guinea-pig, a 
puppy, or a kitten, let it be understood 
that he is to let nothing, no play or frolic, 
interfere with his care for it at stated 
hours, for it must be clearly comprehended 
at the beginning that we cannot have the 
pleasure of anything without being willing 
to pay its price. There is no childish fault 
which, in the writer's opinion, should be 
more severely punished than cruelty to one 
of these dumb creatures, and none which 
so requires immediate and early checking 
that it may not develop into positive vice 
by and by. 

When all other pets are out of the ques- 
tion in the household, it is often feasible 
to have an aquarium, and indeed it makes 
an interesting addition to any collection, 
however varied. 

It is possible at small expense to make 
74 



In a Nutshell 

one at home ; and if the subject is suffi- 
ciently studied as to balance of ]:>lant and 
animal life, and amount and kind of food 
and water, the children may assist in tak- 
ing care of it, and so gain a great deal of 
pleasure and. knowledge. 

There is always, too, a possibility of scat- 
tering crumbs and seed, for the wild birds 
in spring and fall and winter, and. some 
children of long ago derived the greatest 
possible delight, we remember, one season, 
from keeping a kind of bird-restaurant, and. 
j)roviding in one convenient place assorted 
kinds of food much enjoyed by the feath- 
ered patrons. 

Bands of Mercy 
It is in all these small ways, you see, 
that we develop the child's heart, so little 
touched by ordinary schemes of education; 
that we train his faculties of observation 
and judgment, and that we give him a due 
sense of responsibility. AYe believe that 
every Mother's Club should have a Band 
of Mercy in connection with its work, 
should muster companies of gallant Bird 
75 



The Kindergarten 

Defenders among its associate members, 
and should inculcate by example and pre- 
cej3t and direct teaching that care and ten- 
derness toward all things, both great and 
small, which is the first step toward true 
worship of their Maker. 

Play with Sand 

There is yet another simple, normal oc- 
cupation for children, used in the kinder- 
garten, but quite as suitable for the home, 
and that is playing with sand. No one 
who lived within reach of a sand-pile as a 
child, or who was ever taken to the sea- 
shore to dig and build there to his heart's 
content, can help a retrospective thrill of 
delight as he thinks of those happy baby 
hours. 

And think how simple it is, if you have 
any out-door room for the children, to 
place a load of sand in some convenient 
spot, enclose it with a board or two to pre- 
vent its spreading, and arrange some sort 
of awning or covering above for warm or 
wet days. There all the children, even to 
the baby, may be deposited for an hour or 
76 



In a Nutshell 

so a day, and if provided with spades, pails 
to fill and empty, and some building mate- 
rials, would not change their lots for those 
of all the crowned heads in Europe. 

If your children, poor city prisoners, 
have no playground, provide for them in- 
doors a stout water-tight box, about five 
feet long by four wide, and at least a 
foot deep, set on legs with castors; fill 
that with sand, buy smaller spades and 
pails, and a variety of tins for cake-bak- 
ing, and sun yourself in the delight you 
are giving. 

Here all the kindergarten gifts, rather 
small for the out-door work, may be ap- 
propriately used; here we may plant trees 
and load their branches with magnificent 
fruit represented by the balls; here we may 
pasture toy animals, fencing them in with 
the second gift beads threaded on sticks; 
here we may build houses, barns, whole 
villages, if desired, with the blocks, and 
here we may lay out flower-beds and de- 
sign miniature gardens to our heart's con- 
tent. 

If any mother here lifts up her voice and 
77 



The Kindergarten 



&' 



protests that she has no room for even a 
sand-table, suggest to her a deep tray 
hinged to the wall and folded against it 
when not in use. This may have an open- 
ing in the bottom, through which the sand 
may be emptied when the play is over, 
and no child, be sure, would ever complain 
of the work of making the plaything 
ready.* 

This sand-work, of whatever kind it may 
be, is especially beneficial because it pro- 
vides so many opportunities for united ac- 
tion. The children gather about the heap 
or table together, and together learn to 
play, frequently combining their efforts 
toward some desired end. 

Sand differs from other play-materials 
also in that it is quite as delightful for the 
baby, who does little but fill his vessels 
with it and empty them again, as for the 
more skilful child, who builds houses, for- 
tresses, and castles, and lays out relief- 
maps of all countries with the responsive, 
easily handled substance. 

* Extended suggestions on the use of sand will 
be found in "Republic of Childhood," Vol. II. 

78 



In a Nutshell 

Simple, Natural Occupations 

There is much to be said about these 
simple, natural occupations for children, 
much one might claim as to the serenity 
and vigour they bring, just because they 
are simple and natural. The quieter and 
more undisturbed our little ones are, the 
more freedom they are given to wander in 
the fields and play in the brook and dig in 
the ground, the less they are occupied with 
exciting sights and complicated toys — elab- 
orate dolls, puzzling contrivances that need 
winding up, perfect mechanical inventions 
that require no labour of small hands to 
complete them — the more normal and ra- 
tional human beings are they likely to be- 
come, and the more complete and unfet- 
tered will be their development. 



79 



The Kindergarten 
CHAPTER V 

COME, TELL US A STORY 

Selim, son of Auz, is said to have been 
the first Egyptian story-teller, but as the 
date when he charmed his audiences is 
given as only a few thousand years ago, 
and as Egypt is the seat of one of the most 
ancient of civilisations, we are forced to 
believe that he must have had a vast com- 
pany of humble predecessors. 

Indeed — for this is woman's century and 
woman's country, and we may fearlessly 
say what we like of ourselves — it would not 
at all surprise us to learn that the first 
Egyptian story-teller was the daughter, not 
the son of anybody, and that her achieve- 
ments have never been properly recorded. 

Women as Story-Tellers 
We wonder in these days of the exalta- 
tion of women that more has not been said 
of their services to literature as preservers 

80 



In a Nutshell 

of the nursery tales of all nations. Most 
of the modern collections in this line, for 
instance, so valuable to adults as well as to 
children, were taken down, substantially 
as they stand, from the lips of women 
whose memories were as fragrant with the 
old tales as a rose-jar of its spicy con- 
tents. 

And it is no cause for wonder that this 
should be so, for since the beginning of 
the world mothers have been story-tellers, 
forced to practise the art whether they 
would or not, and since it was not consid- 
ered essential that they should receive in- 
struction in the schools, a larger capacity 
remained in their minds for the storage 
of myth and fable and legend. When we 
talk to women of story- telling, then, we 
talk to them of something which should be 
theirs by inheritance as much as an apti- 
tude for needlework, although, like that 
art, it needs practice to attain perfection. 
The word mother presupposes the word 
child, and the child who does not care for 
stories is as difficult to find as the pot of 
gold at the foot of the rainbow, so incredi- 
6 81 



The Kindergarten 

ble a creation, indeed, that it would be 
waste of time to search for him. 

The story has commonly been told no 
doubt in all times, more to amuse the lit- 
tle people and to keep them quiet than for 
any deeper reason, and such instruction as 
it might have conveyed was given uncon- 
sciously. It is by no means universally 
understood, even now, that it is at once 
literature and the drama, science and his- 
tory, to the youthful mind, nor that it is 
one of the most valuable means which a 
mother can employ for giving moral guid- 
ance and bringing the force of example to 
bear upon the child's intelligence. 

Stories Which Have Decided Destinies 
There are many cases in which a well- 
told story is of marked effect in determin- 
ing the course of future life and occupa- 
tion. A noted genealogist, for instance, 
traces his interest in kin and lineage, and 
the bent of his manhood's labours, to the 
thrilling tale he often heard as a child at 
his grandfather's knee, of the founder of 
the family, who was thrown upon these 
82 



In a Nutshell 

coasts, a shipwrecked sailor, many a year 
ago. The anecdote was so well told, with a 
wealth of picturesque detail, and therefore 
so often demanded, that it made a deej) 
impression upon his imagination, and as 
he pondered over it from day to day, it 
became a nucleus around which all his 
thoughts were centred. 

Some of our greatest novelists, Sir "Wal- 
ter Scott, for instance, have attributed 
their success in weaving tales of romance 
and adventure to their childhood memories 
of nurses' bed-time stories, of ballads told 
on winter evenings round the fire, and of 
gallant deeds of history proudly recounted 
over and over, again and again, in the 
home circle. 

"When the heart is young, the mind fresh 
and unworn, it is then that we receive 
these ineffaceable impressions, and then 
that our lives get their bent for time and 
eternity, for 

"... we live by Admiration, Hope, and Love, 
And ev'n as these are well and wisely fix'd, 
In dignity of being we ascend." 



S3 



The Kindergarten 

Literary Interest in the Bud 
The veriest baby feels and shows a pleas- 
ure in hearing rhymes and jingles, attracted 
by the musical voice and the cadence of syl- 
lables rather than the meaning, no doubt, 
yet thereby gaining a power of attention 
which will be of service later in life. This 
is, perhaps, the beginning of interest in 
literature; or if it may not be called by so 
lofty a name, may at least be considered 
the first steps toward joy in the music of 
verse. 

If we should try to catalogue the benefits 
derived by the child from an early and 
a constant hearing of the right kind of 
stories, we would be surprised at the bulky 
volume that would grow under our hands. 
The trouble is that we do not take these 
things seriously enough, and fail to realise 
what we are doing when we minister to the 
child's instinctive hunger for literature. 
To quiet him with the first tale that comes 
to mind is like drugging a baby to sleep, 
or feeding him with some substance which 
will create a hurtful appetite by and by. 
Doubtless we may cultivate a taste for read- 
84 



In a Nutshell 

ing by so doing, but that is by no means 
only and always a blessing. Better the 
child should never open a book at all than 
that he should poison his mind and lower 
his ideals by feeding upon dime novels, 
vulgar newspapers, and cheap railway 
fiction, or upon those higher-priced and 
more artistically handled literary produc- 
tions whose style can but give delight, 
while their subject-matter darkens and 
degrades every mind into which it fil- 
ters. 

It seems to be considered by some par- 
ents that the ideal to be reached with a 
child is that he should be able to sit quiet 
and read, forgetting that the flood of cheap 
newspapers, books, and magazines now 
sweeping over every country may have 
brought to his lips the rankest poison, or, 
if not that, some lowering, enfeebling sub- 
stance, instead of a tonic or a stimulant. 
When we note what young people are read- 
ing everywhere, in horse-cars and trains, in 
stations and hotels, in stables and kitchens, 
in shops and barracks, in cottages and man- 
sions, we wonder if the Chinese did well 
85 



The Kindergarten 

when they invented printing, and whether 
the cheapness of modern literature may not 
be counted as much for evil as for good in 
education. 



Taste in Literature a Growth 
The lack of efficient oversight in young 
people's reading is partly due, no doubt, 
to the belief that good taste in literature is 
something that inevitably comes with ma- 
turity, like long dresses and tail coats, and 
which therefore need not be prepared for, 
forgetting that taste is a matter of experi- 
ence and judgment and cultivation, and 
must have its humble beginnings like every 
other good thing. 

Some Little Heroes Whom Children Love 
If we take the subject of story-telling on 
the moral side we see at once that the 
heroes of our histories become ideals upon 
which the little one unconsciously forms 
himself. Listen to the echoes of your own 
childhood, if you doubt the statement, and 
see if a story of long ago does not come 
back to you, a faint, far-off strain that 
86 



In a Nutshell 

once made the music of your days. Some- 
times such a memory furnishes deep con- 
viction of the truth of an educational the- 
ory, for 

" The eye grown dim to present things 
Has keener sight for bygone years, 
And sweet and clear, to deafening ears 
The bird that sang at morning sings." 

Do you remember how you repented not 
sharing your cake with your sister when 
the shocking avarice of King Midas was 
held up to your scorn ? 

Do you remember how you shuddered at 
the very thought of disobedience when that 
unfortunate little maid — what was her 
name ? — defied her mother's commands 
and was lost in the dark forest ? Do you 
remember Harry and his dog Trusty, and 
how the boy was put to bed on the day of 
his birthday party because he abused his 
faithful companion ? 

Do you recall that small heroine who, 

left alone in the lighthouse, climbed the 

tower and lighted the lamp herself to save 

the sailors tossing in the storm below ? 

87 



The Kindergarten 

And have you forgotten — though of course 
you have not, nobody could — that heroic 
Dutch boy who, discovering the leak in the 
dyke, stopped it with his own hand, and 
sat there all the night, cold, hungry, and 
cramped with pain, until help came in the 
morning ? 

These few instances serve to show how 
stories may quicken the sympathies of chil- 
dren as well as furnish them with hero 
types. Much thoughtlessness and cruelty 
might be prevented at the moment and 
averted for the future if the imagination 
were sufficiently quickened to see as by 
reflected light the desires and feelings 
of others, whether they be kinsfolk with 
wings and paws or little human brothers. 
These two are bound together, the imagi- 
nation and the sympathy, and if you touch 
the one the other thrills. A charming 
boy of the writer's acquaintance, for in- 
stance, confessed to her one day that it had 
never occurred to him that birds had any 
affections or feelings resembling his own, 
until he heard the story of " The Stolen 
Nest," and that then he was so filled with 



In a Nutshell 

contrition at his own misdeeds that he hid 
himself in the haymow to blot them out 
with tears. 

Hearing Stories Quickens the Imagination 
If we could prove that story-telling, when 
properly conducted, is one of the most effi- 
cient helps in cultivating the imagination 
we should have made good its claim to 
consideration in home and school. For 
imagination is a power in life because it 
gives us ideals toward which we may aspire; 
it is a power in labour because it is allied to 
invention; it is a power in that it helps us 
to pass outside our own experience and ap- 
preciate the views of others, and it is a power 
in that it may fill the mind with beautiful 
images which push out in their growth 
those which are vicious and degraded. 

" Train the imagination," says Kichter, 
" and a child can play by himself," and if 
this sometimes most desirable end could be 
reached, there is no overworked, harassed 
mother but would gladly do her part to- 
ward bringing it about. 

Shall we make further additions to our 
89 



The Kindergarten 

list of the benefits of story-telling ? We 
may find them in the habit of concentrated 
attention to which it gives rise, in the new 
and valuable words it adds to the vocabu- 
lary, and in the pleasant introduction it 
makes to science and history as well as to 
literature. 

Listening to Stories Trains the Voice 
It is valuable, too, in a very practical 
way as a means of vocal training. The 
child who is accustomed to hearing well- 
told stories is necessarily accustomed to a 
well-modulated voice, used with proper in- 
flection and appropriate expression. 

What he constantly hears he cannot 
choose but imitate, for he is a creature of 
imitation, and this not only helps to form 
his ordinary speech, but passes onward into 
school life and makes him a clear and ex- 
pressive reader when the time for oral read- 
ing comes. 

Telling, Not Reading the Stories 
Kindergartners believe that if the best 
results are to come from story-telling it 



In a Nutshell 

should be begun very early — long before 
interest in books has made its appearance, 
and that in the simplest way it may be 
practised as soon as the baby begins to talk 
— indeed, as soon as he begins to understand 
what his mother or his nurse says to him. 

We advocate telling the tales rather than 
reading them because, first, it is the method 
by which the race received them when the 
world was young, and therefore inherently 
suitable to the young child. 

Second, we come into much closer rela- 
tion with the hearer in this way, and are 
better able to adopt voice and manner, ges- 
ture and length of recital to the transparent 
needs so near at hand. Again, the narra- 
tive seems much more real and impressive 
and personal, much more a " truly story," 
as the children say, if it seems to come 
direct from the heart rather than from a 
cold, printed page; and, lastly, in reading, 
the eyes are hidden, and to young children 
the expression in the eyes of their mothers 
during the recital of either a rhyme or a 
story seems absolutely necessary to its com- 
plete comprehension. 
91 



The Kindergarten 



&> 



It is questionable whether we ever en- 
tirely outgrow the feeling that we can un- 
derstand better when we can see the face 
of the speaker; for notice the shifting of 
seats, the bending and twisting that go on 
in church to get within the range of the 
minister's eyes, although his voice may be 
audible in every part of the building. 

Notice, too, the immediate effect upon 
the congregation when he lays aside his 
notes, takes off his spectacles, and illus- 
trates some point of his sermon by an anec- 
dote. "When I was in Jerusalem," he 
begins, and immediately the drowsy awake, 
and all wandering eyes are turned upon 
him. 

Mothers Should Learn the Art 

There is obviously great diversity in nat- 
ural gift for the art we are urging upon 
our readers. Some women are "born 
story-tellers," as the saying is, and these 
are by no means always educated persons 
— in fact, are likely to be the opposite, for 
too early and too much reading often 
weaken the memory and the power of 
lively narration. Let us agree at the out- 



In a Nutshell 

set that some mothers have little aptitude 
for this branch of child culture, that they 
find it difficult to learn and can never hope 
to excel in it. What then ? The only re- 
course is to begin very early when the chil- 
dren are quite undeveloped, confident that 
by the time they shall have become critical 
we, by much practice, shall have grown 
nearer to perfection. It is folly to say that 
we cannot learn to do these things. We 
are not called upon to write the stories, 
nor even to make them over; indeed, it 
were best not to make the attempt so long 
as there are masters in literature to do it 
for us ; but if we are thoroughly in ear- 
nest, and endowed with ordinary gifts, and 
with that "deep instinct of parental love 
which has created all educational systems 
and institutions," we shall gain a grati- 
fying measure of success in this new field 
of work. 

Mothers' Clubs Should Study the Subject 

It will be well for the members of the 

Mothers' Clubs to take up story-telling as 

one of their regular subjects of study. 

93 



The Kindergarten 

When the value of the art is understood 
Jet certain typical stories be selected — 
really fine ones which will repay thought 
and study — and let these be given out to 
various persons to prepare for the next 
meeting. The thread of the tale must, of 
course, be memorised, and as much of the 
language as will make it fall trippingly 
from the tongue without breaks or hesita- 
tion. 

The first story learned it may be neces- 
sary to repeat to one's self a score of times 
before one can feel sure enough of it to 
tell it aloud, and even then before it is given 
at the club it would be well to try it with 
the children and see how those outspoken 
and competent critics regard it. The sec- 
ond effort will doubtless be much easier, 
but no work of this kind, however pro- 
tracted it may be, can be considered wasted, 
for it gives the best of training to the mem- 
ory and to the powers of expression, as well 
as furnishes a valuable test of self-posses- 
sion and readiness for emergencies. 



04 



In a Nutshell 

Selecting Stories for Young Children 
In selecting a tale for young children an 
important thing for the novice to consider 
is its length, and here the size of the audi- 
ence must be counted with as well as the 
class of homes it represents. Your own 
child, for instance, who is accustomed to 
conversation, and has already some com- 
mand of language, would hear and profit 
by a story twice as long, perhaps, as would 
a neglected street waif to whom the exer- 
cise is altogether new. It is generally con- 
ceded that children of five to seven years 
do not give close and voluntary attention 
for more than fifteen minutes at a time, 
and ten minutes will generally be found 
quite enough for a really finished tale with 
considerable dramatic interest, while the 
first essays in the art need not occupy a 
third of this time. 

The language in which the narrative is 
clothed must be conceded to be a subject 
of some importance if we believe that the 
child is learning the beauties of his mother- 
tongue as he listens. If, therefore, there 
be any member of the club who is conscious 
95 



The Kindergarten 



t> 



that early associations are stronger than 
education in her case, and that her expres- 
sions are not always absolutely accurate 
or elegant, it would be well for her to 
memorise the tale entirely, lest she prop- 
agate her errors by trusting too much to 
her own diction. 

Poetry for Little Children 
When we speak of telling stories to the 
little people prose narratives seem to be 
commonly understood, and as commonly 
used, but there is no mistake greater than 
to suppose that children are not susceptible 
to the charms of poetry. They care more 
for it, on the contrary, than the majority of 
grown people, whether for the melody, the 
rhythm, the rhymes, the short lines, the 
simplicity and picturesqueness of expres- 
sion, or for all these reasons together, 
which make it a thing pleasantly different 
from common speech. Goethe advised 
that every child should see a pretty pic- 
ture and hear a beautiful poem every day, 
and if we would not banish the charm of 
poetry from mature life it behooves us to 
96 



In a Nutshell 

follow his advice and subject the child to 
its influence at the time of greatest sus- 
ceptibility. 

It is unnatural and abnormal, for in- 
stance, that in a recent investigation in a 
Western city of the preferences in reading 
of one thousand children from nine to fif- 
teen years old, only ten girls and no boys 
of the former age, and but a small jorojior- 
tion of the older children, should express 
any interest in poetry. It follows either 
that little or no verse has been read or re- 
peated to them, and that so the taste is 
dormant, or that selections appropriate to 
their years have not been made. 

To whatever cause the evil may be due, 
steps should be taken to correct it, for to 
be devoid of interest in poetry shuts one 
off from delight as much as if one were 
colour-blind or tone-deaf. 

A Wise Choice to be Made 

If all the benefits which we have outlined 

are to come from the hearing of stories, it 

follows that they must be wisely chosen ; 

not only in regard to the moral which 

7 97 



The Kinderg-arten 



& 



must be a part of their make-up, not 
tacked on at the end like a kite-tail, but 
as to the themes they treat of and the style 
in which they are treated. When it comes 
to the task of choosing, it must be acknowl- 
edged that not every story which appears 
even in first-class juvenile periodicals can 
be recommended as appropriate, and it is, 
perhaps, best to confide in the children's 
classics, those which have triumphantly 
stood the test of time, for general use, in- 
terspersing them now and then with a tale 
of to-day. 

We must beware, however, of giving the 
mind a one-sided development by confin- 
ing ourselves too much to one branch of 
literature; we must include in our reper- 
tory some well-selected myths, fairy stories 
which are pure and spiritual in tone, a 
fable now and then, nature stories, hero 
tales, animal anecdotes, occasional narra- 
tives about good, wholesome children, 
neither prigs nor infant villains, plenty of 
fine verses and ballads, as has been said, 
and, for the older ones of the family, 
legends, allegories, historic happenings, 
98 



In a Nutshell 

and tales of travel and adventure. These 
must be administered according to the age 
and development of the little ones under 
our care, and diversified to suit their sev- 
eral and particular needs. More explicit 
or fuller directions can hardly be given 
without knowledge of the special case in 
question, for only a quack sells a nostrum 
warranted to cure every ill of the flesh, no 
matter when and how administered. 

All Children Love the Old Favourites 
A large stock of stories is not essential 
for little children. They feel, as Bulwer 
said, the beauty and the holiness that dwell 
in the customary and the old ; and they are 
well pleased — and it is best that it should 
be so — with hearing the same old favourites 
repeated again and again, in song or story. 



Gestures and Illustrations 
We kindergarten people believe in ac- 
companying a story for the babies with 
natural, descriptive gestures, which seem 
frequently to illuminate the meaning of 
the words, and also with pictures or rapid 
99 



The Kindergarten 



&' 



sketches, but these are not essential in 
dealing with a few children in the home. 
It is an admirable idea, too, to encourage 
the children to become illustrators occasion- 
ally, for when they are carried away by the 
spirit of the narrative they occasionally do 
very good work. Even when this is not 
the case, their drawings are still valuable, 
for they show just how much of the plot 
has been understood, what points have been 
especially appreciated and most deeply im- 
pressed, and also, sometimes, into what dire 
mistakes and errors the unfortunate story- 
teller has fallen. 

Where May Good Stories be Found"? 
As to the source whence the best stories 
for little people may be drawn, the various 
kindergarten magazines are glad to furnish 
expert advice on the subject; publishers 
of the standard juvenile periodicals have 
always many appropriate books, both in 
prose and verse, upon their lists; all kin- 
dergarten training teachers will count it a 
pleasure to assist an earnest mother in her 
quest for good literature, and any intelli- 
100 



In a Nutshell 

gent and experienced kindergartner will 
cheerfully give directions to the storehouses 
from which she draws her stock of tales. 

The National Congress of Mothers, if a 
fuller list be required, has just sent out a 
pamphlet on children's literature which 
is full of good suggestions and carefully 
classified, and is provided with a price-list 
and names of publishers.* 

There is no lack of material, then, and 
no lack of advisers; there is certainly no 
lack of hearers, for, failing children of our 
own, there are always the waifs of the hos- 
pitals, asylums, shelters, refuges, and 
foundling homes to whom every right- 
minded woman's thoughts must go out in 
love and pity. No, there is no lack but 
one — that of desire to enter upon this work 
that blesses him that gives and him that 
takes, and only one place to find it — in 
your own heart. 

* Many stories and books for children are rec- 
ommended in " The Republic of Childhood." 



101 



The Kindergarten 



CHAPTEK VI 

COME AND PLAY WITH US 

Do you know those curious artificers who 
carve long passages from the Koran on the 
polished shell of a walnut, or inscribe the 
Beatitudes on a cherry-stone ? 

Such a craftsman must be the writer 
who attempts to give the import of the 
kindergarten songs and games in a single 
chapter, and, like most of the walnut-shell 
inscriptions, it will doubtless require to be 
read by the aid of a magnifying-glass. 

It is fortunate, however, that the neces- 
sary instrument is already in the hands of 
every woman who reads this handbook, 
however poor and humble she may be, and 
its mountings are wrought of interest and 
observation and its lenses are of love. 

Froebel's songs and games, as he hands 
them down to us in the "Mother-Play" 
{Mutter-u7id-Kose-Lieder), were the prod- 
uct of long, patient, and tender observation 
102 



In a Nutshell 

of mother and child as they played freely 
and unconsciously together. The mother's 
instincts, thought Froebel, if she be one of 
God's mothers, are commonly to be trusted 
in what concerns the welfare of her little 
one, but since she has ceased to be purely 
an instinctive creature she needs an expla- 
nation and a guide for the impulses which 
arise within her. She may touch exactly 
the right note in some play she devises for 
the baby, but through failure to under- 
stand the meaning and importance of her 
act she may either never repeat it, or, re- 
peating it, omit its essential features. 

The Vital Thing in the Mother's Plays 
The vital thing in all these fond, caress- 
ing mother-plays, this tender, coaxing, 
half -sportive, half-serious intercourse, is 
that it shall be begun early enough and 
seriously enough . The mother errs deeply, 
says Froebel, and errs to the great detri- 
ment of the whole future life of her help- 
less infant, if she doubts that he is suscep- 
tible to her words, actions, feelings, and 
thoughts. 

103 



The Kindergarten 

He is affected by them as the kernel hid- 
den deep in the earth or the bud on the 
tree covered by hard scales is sensitive to 
the return of the spring or even to a warm 
but evanescent breath of air. And clearly 
it must be so, Froebel goes on to say, " for 
that which can develop and originate, and 
is intended to. do so, begins, and must be- 
gin, when as yet nothing exists but the 
conditions." Mrs. Browning, mother and 
poet too, expressed to perfection the whole 
philosophy of the thing when she said: 

" Women know 
The way to rear up children (to be just); 
They know a simple, merry, tender knack 
Of tying sashes, fitting baby-shoes, 
And stringing pretty words that make no sense, 
And kissing full sense into empty words; 
Which things are corals to cut life upon, 
Although such trifles." 



Study of the "Mother-Play" 

To thoroughly understand Froebel's idea 
of play and its connection with later knowl- 
edge and being, to appreciate his convic- 
104 



In a Nutshell 

tion of the supreme importance of the germ 
stage of life and what he considers the true 
relation which should exist between mother 
and child, it is necessary to give exhaustive 
study to the " Mother-Play," which is the 
broad foundation for those " corals to cut 
life upon," the kindergarten songs and 
games. Some reference was made to this 
book in the first chapter of this handbook, 
and it was advised that the Mothers' Clubs 
should take it as a subject of serious study. 
It is full of meaning from cover to cover, 
and including the cover, which bears a 
symbolic picture showing the mother with 
her children, crowned with oak leaves, her 
eyes turned heavenward, her path strewn 
with thorns and roses, and the father with 
his sword and eagle helmet tenderly lead- 
ing the older son and daughter over the 
rough stones of life. 

Each picture should be carefully studied, 
for they were all made by Froebel's direc- 
tions and under his own eye, and are full 
of significant details. The motto for the 
mother and the song for the child may 
then be taken up, and it will be a most 
105 



The Kindergarten 



& 



interesting exercise to see how far their 
inmost meaning can be deciphered before 
turning to Froebel's own interpretations 
which accompany the volume. These, 
also, need most careful reading and expla- 
nation, and it Deed discourage no one if at 
first they seem to be somewhat obscure and 
mystical, for kindergartners Avho have spent 
years in studying the book never take it up 
without finding a new truth somewhere in 
its pages. 

It will be advisable, also, for the differ- 
ent members of the club, remembering 
that all the infantile experiences given in 
the book are typical ones, to try and recall 
corresponding incidents in their own lives 
and those of their children, and any famil- 
iar nursery plays which they may already 
know that seem to be written on the same 
lines. 

Nor must we be content merely to re- 
ceive each song as a text for memorising, 
but we must write a sermon on it and give 
it a practical application. The thought 
must be, not only what does the motto 
mean to me, and what is the deepest truth 
106 



In a Nutshell 

in the child-song, bnt how can I use both 
in the nursery, here and now ? 

Although the essence of the kindergar- 
ten games is cooperation, and although we 
feel that one of their highest values is the 
training which they give in the social vir- 
tues, yet when we study their originals 
in the "Mother-Play" we discover that 
they were obviously written for mother 
and child alone, and need no other and 
no dearer participants. Here, then, the 
lonely woman in the lighthouse, and her 
no less lonely sister on the cattle-ranch or 
in the mining-camp, uncounted miles from 
neighbours, may find solace in the thought 
that Froebel remembered them in their 
solitude and gave them in this book a 
means of full development for themselves 
and their children. 

The Games Illustrate Universal Experiences 

The games in the "Mother-Play," it 
should be understood, deal with the uni- 
versal experiences which come to every 
child and which every mother will recog- 
107 



The Kindergarten 

nise as familiar. The words Froebel some- 
times recalled from his own childhood, 
sometimes found in use in simple, peasant 
homes, and he adapted or rewrote the more 
useful ones for this volume, while he often 
framed new verses to illustrate instinctive 
acts of the child which he observed or 
which were repeated to him. 

All the songs — for, alas! the great child- 
lover was childless himself — were tried 
from time to time by mothers of his ac- 
quaintance with their babies, and were 
changed as experience seemed to demand, 
so that all have borne the test of practice. 

They begin with the "Kicking Song," 
or "Play with the Limbs," illustrating 
the common habit of infants of lying on 
their backs and tramping the feet, as if to 
anticipate walking. The mother shown 
in the accompanyiug picture feels instinc- 
tively that the baby seeks for something by 
which to measure his strength, and holds 
her hands so that his feet may alternately 
strike against them, while she sings a song 
of the mill as it crushes the seeds to make 
oil for the night-lamp. And this is Froe- 
108 



In a Nutshell 

bel's comment upon the action in the 
motto : 

" This is not mere fond caprice — 
God inspires the pretty strife ; 
She is leading the beginner 
Through the outer to the inner 
Of his groping life." 

Games Which Help the Body and the Hands 

Next comes the little play called ' ' Falling, 
Falling," which is intended to strengthen 
the whole body as well as to give a spirit- 
ual impression. The infant lies upon a 
cushion and the mother lifts him a little 
from his reclining posture, letting him slip 
back again with a slight shock, just enough 
to make him realise the difference between 
here and there, rising and falling, support 
and loss of support, union and separation, 
and at the same time leading him to appre- 
ciate his own strength. 

The next two songs, the " Weathercock " 
and " All Gone," will be recognised as old 
favourites in every nursery, and here the 
movement of hands and fingers begins and 
is continued to the end of the book. Froe- 
109 



The Kindergarten 

bel had, of course, noticed that the hands 
and fingers are the earliest parts of the 
physical self to attract attention, and his 
knowledge of that fact is shown by the vari- 
ous songs in which the fingers are named 
and counted, put to sleep, made to dance 
and play, and taught to greet each other. 

These songs were devised not only to 
give strength and suppleness to these mem- 
bers, but — and this is far more important 
— by attaching a playful meaning to their 
movements, to interest the mind in them 
and lift them out of the domain of the 
purely physical. 

The finger-songs are favourites in every 
kindergarten; not only the old "Mother- 
Play '' originals being sung, but numbers 
of dainty new ones framed on the same 
lines with which all the standard music 
books are provided.* 

There are songs, too, in the "Mother- 
Play " for exercising the senses, and these, 

* Miss Emelie Poulsson of Boston has written 
so many of these charming songs, every one of 
which would be a home delight, that she is begin- 
ning to be known as "The Finger-Play Lady." 
110 



In a Nutshell 

with their modern variants, should be used 
in every nursery. Mothers have always 
done a little of this sense-training with an 
instinctive knowledge of its mental and 
spiritual value, but Froebel explains to 
them the meaning of their instinct, and 
provides ample means to gratify it. 

There is a " Pat-a-Cake " song, too, in 
this wonderful book, even better than our 
own old. favourite; songs about the sweet, 
familiar things of daily life — chickens, 
pigeons, birds' nests, flowers, stars, and 
sunshine; and there are shadow plays that 
the father can use with the baby at night 
when the lamps are lighted. 

These Mother-Play Songs are All Simple 
There are beautiful versions of those 
games of Bo-Peep and Hide and Seek 
which every one instinctively plays with 
babies, and there are games which take 
up trade life and sing of the joiner, the 
carpenter, the baker, and the wheelwright. 
Everything is here, in suggestion at least, 
down to the Church songs, which close 
the volume, and to the "Little Artist," 
111 



The Kindergarten 

wherein the child who is older grown is 
seeking to give out again the many im- 
pressions which have crowded in upon his 
brain. 

There are now three English translations 
of the " Mother-Play," the latest of which, 
by Miss Susan Blow, is provided with new 
music and words for all the songs — music 
which, as Charles Reade said of the Breton 
ditties, " is tunable as the lark that carols 
over the green wheat in April, ' ' and ' ' words 
so simple and motherly that a nation might 
take them to heart." * 

From these "Mother-Play" songs, as 
already said, the entire scheme of modern 
kindergarten games is developed, and 
though all may be played by mother and 
child alone, almost all may be expanded 
to suit a circle of children in nursery or 
kindergarten, and thus be made a thou- 
sandfold more useful and delightful. 

We cannot estimate too highly the value 

* Miss Blow has just published a volume of 
commentaries on the " Mother-Play" and on the 
philosophy of Froebel, entitled "Letters to a 
Mother." 

112 



In a Nutshell 

of companionship to children, the worth 
of a social intercourse between equals, and 
this is brought out marvellously in these 
games of Froebel. Here each child be- 
comes so interested that he would gladly 
play every part in each small drama him- 
self, yet he can do nothing alone, and very 
soon he sees that the cooperation of others 
is necessary if there is to be any real hap- 
piness. 

Lessons in Citizenship are Taught 
No moral lecture is needed to teach a 
child that "joy flies monopolists"; he 
sees it illustrated under his own eyes, and, 
led by the teaching, learns to surrender his 
selfish desires to the common good. He 
learns here also, for his playmates teach it, 
that first lesson of a good citizen, that the 
amount of liberty he can enjoy is depend- 
ent upon his non-interference with the 
rights of others, and thus, in baby fashion, 
he prepares himself for later civic life. 
There is no time when the child so fully 
and unconsciously reveals himself, his 
strength and his weakness, as in the kin- 
8 113 



The Kindergarten 

dergarten games, and therefore there is no 
time better suited to studying his person- 
ality and deciding upon what it needs for 
harmonious development. 

Value of Musical Training 

When we begin to think of introducing 
Froebel's songs and games to the life of 
the home, we must consider as another ad- 
vantage the musical training which they 
give. It is sometimes objected that for 
children who have no musical taste time 
is wasted on such training, but the objec- 
tion rests on a false foundation, for it may 
boldly be said that there are no such chil- 
dren. They all care for music; they are 
all quite willing to sing at first, or until, 
if they are tone-deaf, harsh criticism or 
ridicule have made them conscious of their 
deficiency. It may be questioned, indeed, 
whether any such deficiency would persist 
in after life if they began to sing early 
enough, and every kindergartner who has 
watched the musical development of a child 
who for months growled monotonously and 
114 



In a Nutshell 

cheerfully along on a single note, will agree 
with the writer in her skepticism. 

There seems to be nothing which so 
unites a family as singing together, and 
these kindergarten songs are, for the most 
part, so simple, so melodious, and at the 
same time so full of interest that the older 
boys and girls of the flock commonly de- 
light to learn them also and to help the 
babies to illustrate them. Any person of 
good taste who has tried to find appropri- 
ate songs for little children knows how 
difficult it is to discover anything which 
is not, on the one hand, silly or vapid or 
absolutely nonsensical; or, on the other, 
sentimental, high-flown, or inappropriate 
in subject and treatment. Kindergarten 
songs, whatever they may lack in other 
directions, are always appropriate to child- 
ish interests, and it may also generally be 
said in their praise that there is a some- 
thing in them which appeals to the spirit- 
ual and mental faculties of the singer, as 
well as to his aesthetic taste. 

Should they lack this higher element, 
this over-tone, they would fail entirely in 
" 115 



The Kindergarten 

their supreme object, for they were meant, 
as W. L. Tomlins has said, " to search out 
the flower-germs of the soul, awakening 
them to response and stimulating them to 
a largeness of growth that leaves no place 
for weeds." 

Classes of Kindergarten Games 
A great variety of kindergarten music- 
books is now to be had, and not one of 
them, be it the least upon the list, but 
contains some songs which the children 
will enjoy and by which they may profit. 
Broadly speaking, they all deal in different 
ways and in varying degrees of merit with 
these three great classes of plays: those 
treating of the family and. the home; of 
Nature and the life of Nature, and of the 
trades and industries. One might classify 
and sub-classify under these heads to an 
extent of several pages, perhaps, and might 
add a few minor headings, but these are at 
least the largest and most important, and 
should all be used in our home and neigh- 
bourhood work. If several versions of the 
same game are found in the books at your 
116 



In a Nutshell 

command, that one having the best music 
and most poetic words is, of course, to be 
selected, for it should be our greatest effort 
in the kindergarteu to come as near perfec- 
tion as possible in our settiug of the sub- 
jects we present to the children. 

How the Games are to be Played 
As to the way in which the games are to 
be conducted, some idea may be obtained 
from the " Mother-Play," from the music- 
books, from treatises on the kindergarten, 
aud from the children themselves, who can 
often give ideas on dramatisation if they 
are encouraged to express them. It would, 
of course, be an invaluable assistance to 
the novice who is attempting to conduct 
Froebel's games among the children of her 
neighbourhood if she could spend a few 
mornings in a good child-garden and catch 
some of the spirit, the happiness, the inno- 
cent gayety and enthusiasm which belong 
to true kindergarten play. Failing this, 
some interested kindergartner might per- 
haps be induced to spend an afternoon with 
the Mothers' Club, and, taking up some of 
117 



The Kindergarten 

the standard games, teach the members how 
to play them. If neither of these things 
can be managed, all is not lost if we remem- 
ber that these are movement plays, to be 
used by a circle of children (always a cir- 
cle), and are to be accompanied by gestures 
and imitative activities. They are to be 
played, not merely sung, and all the chil- 
dren are to be encouraged to take part in 
them. The majority of the traditional 
games of children are played in a ring and 
accompanied by singing and movements, 
and as all of us have engaged in them in 
our time, the method in which they were 
managed will be remembered as a hint in 
conducting these far more beautiful and 
spiritual plays of Froebel.* 

Learning to Play with Children 
It may be said, parenthetically, that this 
learning to play with and like children is, 
like everything connected with the kinder- 
garten, as much a blessing to women as to 
those they serve. We have far too little 

* Several chapters on play will be found in 
" The Republic of Childhood," Vol. III. 
118 



In a Nutshell 

play in this country — hearty, physical play 
that sets the blood tingling and gives the 
delight of rhythmic motion, and one wel- 
comes it as a sign of a return to the Gold- 
en Age when one sees the joyousness of 
kindergartners at their festivals, and the 
wholesome way in which they surrender 
themselves to the play-spirit. 

And here is a field for women who are 
neither mothers nor teachers, but who have 
become touched with the magic of the kin- 
dergarten games. Let them go out into the 
highways and hedges, or into the streets 
and alleys for the older children, the neg- 
lected, untutored boys and girls, sharp and 
painfully precocious from crowded city life, 
or dull-witted and heavy from rustic seclu- 
sion and lack of training. When they are 
gathered together, teach them to play — it 
is no easy task — after the kindergarten 
ideal, but games somewhat more advanced 
and requiring greater skill and ability, and 
see how you waken the imagination and 
the powers of loving and hoping and dream- 
ing, and how you touch to finer issues every 
faculty which before lay close-folded under 
119 



The Kindergarten 

the hard crust of every-day life. It will 
not be a new experiment; you need not 
stand back doubting whether it can suc- 
ceed, and fearing to enlist in an uncertain 
cause, for in both England and America 
and wherever the Social Settlement has 
planted its banners, you will find that play 
is looked upon as one of the most hopeful 
educational agencies for the neglected 
child. 

Value of the Kindergarten Games 

It cannot be said too often that the kin- 
dergarten games hold what is highest and 
best in Froebel's philosophy, and for those 
who are interested in the training of chil- 
dren no time can be better spent than in 
studying them. 

Not only are they of the greatest service 
in cultivating the spiritual nature and in 
fostering the civic virtues, but they give 
most valuable physical development and a 
training to the mind which nothing else 
can supply. 

In estimating their worth to the child, 
add the influence of poetry to the influence 
120 



In a Nutshell 

of music and of gesture, set down in the 
column the sympathetic comprehension 
which they give of Nature and human re- 
lationships, of the value of labour, of time 
and order, of dependence and interdepend- 
ence, of care and protection, of love and 
duty, and multiply the sum by the compan- 
ionship of other children. The product 
will be an astonishing one, such an array 
of figures that we cannot attempt to take 
them in, but can only gaze upon them in 
wonder as they stretch across the page. 

The Right Hand Must Guide the Work 

But it must not be forgotten that to ob- 
tain this product you must have the right 
multiplier and the right multiplicand, and 
though you possess the former, the latter 
will not be yours until the right numbers 
have been added together to make it. 

And even then, when all the essentials 
have been gathered, the arithmetical pro- 
cess will not perform itself. The right 
hand must hold the pencil in. the kinder- 
garten, as in all other work, and behind 
121 



The Kindergarten 

the hand must be the brain to think, the 
heart to love, and the soul to aspire. 

Froebel was thinking of the ideal leader 
of children, whether mother or teacher, 
when he said : 

" With each caress, each care, each merry play 
Her own soul deepens for God's love ; 
And as the sun with fervent ray 

Draws each small flower to look above, 
She draws her child's soul forth to meet her 

own, 
And learns that love, in earth and Heaven, is 
one." 



122 



In a Nutshell 
CHAPTEE VII 

COME, LET US LIVE WITH OUR CHILDREN" 

It has lately been said by one of our 
most thoughtful aud far-seeing American 
writers that the kindergarten movement 
promised to become the most important 
feature of contemporary educational his- 
tory. Those of us who are in the midst of 
the current have long felt that this must 
be true, but it is so difficult to make an 
impartial estimate of the force that sweeps 
one's own life along, that it is well to have 
the final judgment pronounced by those 
whose ships are afloat on other waters. 

It is not alone that here and there over 
the country, wherever superintendents and 
school boards have recognised the value 
of the Froebel idea, that steps have been 
taken to make it the initial stage of educa- 
tion; it is not alone that training schools 
for kindergartners multiply with each year, 
and with each year the number of their 
123 



The Kindergarten 

students increases; it is not alone that the 
National Educational Association now gives 
the kindergarten an honoured place upon 
its programmes, and the International Kin- 
dergarten Union annually holds crowded 
conferences in various cities of the United 
States; it is not alone these things, but the 
fact that behind them all is the tremen- 
dous spiritual force of Froebel's philosophy 
as it has become a motive power in the 
hearts of women. 

Power of Froebel's Philosophy 
It is impossible to think of the kinder- 
garten as you would of any other system of 
education, for it is infinitely more than' 
this; it is a philosophy of life, a gospel of 
good works, and an interpreter of religions. 
It does not address women alone, but it 
has for them a special message — a message 
that they yearn to hear even while yet its 
import is unknown to them, a message that 
once heard will be repeated to another, and 
to another still, until the earth is filled 
with the sound thereof. 

There is something about thekindergar- 
124 



In a Nutshell 

ten that is like the sweep of a great, new 
faith; its votaries are enthusiasts, and they 
will not be withheld from preaching and 
teaching. To give an illustration, not 
long ago two women in the middle West 
fitted up their own travelling carriage, and 
drove day after day through great sections 
of country for no other purpose than that 
they might hold open-air meetings on the 
subject of the kindergarten. 

A solitary instance, you say, and one 
perhaps never to be repeated. Very likely; 
but what does it show as to the strength 
of the idea? Did you ever hear of a 
teacher so impressed with the value of the 
Grube system, for example, that he went 
out into the wilderness to preach its doc- 
trines, or so thrilled with the power of the 
Sheldonian method of object-teaching that, 
like the Ancient Mariner, he detained each 
wedding guest he met that he might talk 
of it ? No, depend upon it, the power of 
the kindergarten is unique. Attack it, lay 
siege to it as you will, pull it down in one 
place, riddle it with shot in another, lay 
low its towers, destroy its battlements, and 
125 



The Kindergarten 

when your warfare is over, the castle is 
still there to be rebuilt aud lived in, for 
you have not stirred a single rock of its 
foundations. 

Women's Work for Children 
Within the last decade those who are in- 
terested in work for children have noted 
that a great impetus has been given to the 
various movements which may be classed 
under this head, and have rightly ascribed 
to the kindergarten and to the kindergart- 
ner the growing interest taken by women 
all over the country in their special duties 
and responsibilities. There is scarcely a 
large town in America to-day where there 
is not a branch of the Mothers' Congress, 
a Woman's Club devoted to children and 
their interests, a Child-Study Circle, or a 
Parents' Association. 

And for those persons (generally men) 
skeptical of the advantages of clubs, and 
prone to believe that ideas evaporate there 
in the heat of conversation, it may be said 
that in these same centres of civilisation 
there are numerous courses of lectures 
120 



In a Nutshell 

every season, given by wise and eminent 
persons on matters pertaining to the men- 
tal, physical, and spiritual nature of the 
child, which women may attend without 
other responsibility than that of lending 
a decorous and dignified ear. 

Some of the Froebel training schools of 
our country are now opening special depart- 
ments for the education of women in the 
line of their first duties. The Chautauqua 
Summer School has this year inaugurated 
a series of parents' meetings under the de- 
partment of pedagogy, and in various places 
an especially useful work is well begun — 
that of the proper training of nurse-maids 
according to Froebel's principles. 

The directors of the free kindergartens, 
too, are answerable for the really fine and 
encouraging work which is going on every- 
where under their auspices, for the ignorant 
mothers in their especial corner of the com- 
munity, women who, whether Americans 
or foreigners, are often as well-intentioned 
as the best of us; who only appear dull and 
hard because of the dulness and hardness 
of their lives, and who are most responsive 
127 



The Kindergarten 



&' 



to good influences when once their hearts 
have been unlocked by those magic words, 
" the children." If the kindergarten had 
never been and would never be anything 
else bat an uplifting power, a sweet, saving 
grace, a grammar of life to these women, 
we might still with reason expend upon it 
all our enthusiasm. 

Kindergarten and School United 

Still further must its influence reach, 
however, for it must bring continuity to 
the child's life, it must carry its principles 
over into the school, and make of mother, 
kindergartner, and teacher a harmonious 
trio working together for the good of their 
common charge — a w r eighty and an impor- 
tant trio, too, one wielding great power, and 
to be counted with when dangers threaten 
the integrity of our educational institu- 
tions. 

The kindergarten has not always done 
its duty in this direction, it must be con- 
fessed, and has sometimes fancied it was 
sufficient unto itself, and had nothing to 
128 



In a Nutshell 

lend to or borrow from the school, but 
this error of judgment is being corrected 
now that it has grown older and wiser, and 
it has begun to exercise its precious right 
of cooperating with the other educational 
forces of the community. 

Child-Study 

One of these educational forces, espe- 
cially strong in America at present, is that 
of child-study. In other countries great 
interest is also felt in this subject, but in 
the United States remarkable progress has 
been made and valuable results obtained, 
largely through the enthusiasm of Dr. G. 
Stanley Hall and his remarkable power of 
communicating that enthusiasm not only 
to his colleagues, but to the teaching world. 
The kindergarten already owes much, to 
the new science, but should it be more 
greatly indebted in the future, the account 
would still be no more than balanced, for 
it was Froebel who gave the impetus to 
much of the work, and he who may well 
be called " the father of child-study." 

It is a science to which parents have 
9 129 



The Kindergarten 




much of value to communicate, to which 
they may be of the greatest service, and re- 
ceive, in I|tprn, inestimable help in solv- 
ing their flffpiliar problems. 

se and careful observation 
the time they open their 
id, and accurate recording 
tions, but it gives such a 
the particular child as no 
less living by its side could ever 
id often makes it possible to avert 
"serious evils, either mental, physical, or 
"spiritual, whose beginnings might not 
otherwise have been noticed. 

It enables the mother, when she gives her 
little one into the care of the kindergarten, 
and later into that of the school, to fur- 
nish at the same time a brief record of his 
development up to that date, which is an 
immense saving of time and labour to the 
teacher, and enables her at once to classify 
aticl place him according to his abilities. 
..iSffe knows whether his senses are defec- 
tive; whether he has any small malady, or 
tendency to malady, which must be con- 
sidered; whether he is fond of exercise or 
130 




In a Nutshell 

must be encouraged to take it; whether he 
is irritable or of a nervous temperament ; 
whether he eats and sleeps n^maHy, and 
so on. These points are largflp physical, 
of course, though they alkjtej^uDon edu- 
cation none the less; but r^EaiiiL^^val li- 
able facts that might be 
child's knowledge of coloup' 
tones, as to his experiences, as 
ory, his powers of observation. 
meat, his fancy, his tractability, 
liarities, and his special interests.,,*-" You 
can see at once that the teacher is placed 
in an entirely different position in regard 
to him, and can go to work with a known, 
or measurably known, quantity, instead of 
with an utterly unknown one. % 

One of the most valuable associations 
that women can organise, not only for 
their children, but for themselves*and for 
the future welfare of the community,, is a 
Child-Study Circle; for, banded together 
with such an object in view, the knowledge 
and experience of the one are multiplied by 
the knowledge and experience of the others, 
and the combined force of enthusiasm 
131 



The Kindergarten 

makes a power in their own little corner 
of the world. 

"^ Every mother is more or less of an in- 
stinctive .Qhild-student; but for those who 

i wish to take up the work more definitely 
and with fuller understanding of its bear- 
ings, there are Gountless helps to be had in 

- interesting tracts and pamphlets and books 
upon the subject, in " questionnaires " and 
observation-blanks furnished by Child- 
Study Societies, and in a magazine devoted 
to the science. 

Responsibility of Women for All Children 
In the first chapter of this handbook it 
was urged that no woman who is childless 
or unmarried;, or whose brood is fledged and 
flown, need therefore think that she is ex- 
empt from responsibility in these matters. 
We cannot so hedge ourselves into our own 
little corners and declare that other peo- 
ple's children are other people's business. 
"Business!" as Scrooge's Ghost said. 
" Mankind was my business; the common 
welfare was my business; charity, mercy, 
forbearance, and benevolence were all my 
132 



In a Nutshell ■ 

business! The dealings of my trade were * 
but a drop of water in the comprehensive 
ocean of my business." _^J ^ ^* ^ 

As women, we have a specutfMBfey to- 
ward children — our own children, every- j 
body's children, anybody's .children^ No- 
body's children — a dut^gvliich devolves 
upon us by reason ofWhe" fact that, we^ ^*j» 
are women, and one which is particularly- J> 
urgent upon those who have had the bene- 
fits of safe and shielded lives, careful home 
training, education, and cultivation. 

It is incumbent upon those who have 
freely received to give as freely, and we 
must feel the responsibility so keenly that 
the thought will blossom into action. 

Signs are everywhere visible that women 
are becoming conscious of this one inalien- 
able right of theirs, this clear, unmistak- 
able duty — at once a burden and a bless- 
ing, a task and a privilege, a cross and 
a crown. i> . 

As the child of the legend clung to the ''..„ „ 
saint of old, imploring his aid to cross the ^ \* 
river, so he clings to-day to the garments 
of every woman amongst us. We cannot, 
133 



The Kindergarten in a Nutshell 

we dare nofc turn away from those implor- 
ing eyes, nor .unclasp those baby fingers; 
we must lift up the little one and carry 
him through the troubled depths, though 
his weight in midstream seem almost be- 
yond our strength. 

And if we keep bravely on, who knows, 
when at last we have forded the waters, 
but that we too shall find that, like St. 
Christopher, we have borne the Christ upon 
our shoulders. 



134 



OCT 28 1899 



